Determination of thickness of wax deposition in oil pipelines using gamma-ray transmission method

Wax deposition in pipelines is a crucial problem in the oil industry. An approach that combines the gamma-ray transmission method with scanning technology is proposed to detect the thickness of wax deposition. The performance of the method is validated through simulations with MCNP code. An experiment is also carried out with a 300 mCi 137 Cs source and a LaBr 3 detector. A good correspondence is observed between the simulation and experimental results. The results indicate that the approach is efficient for detecting the thickness of wax deposition in oil pipelines.