Oxygen Measurement Highly Purified Oygen: The Advantage Of Continuous Paramagnetic Oxygen Measurement

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During the production and subsequent use of oxygen, the gas flow must be monitored to ensure perfect quality. This article discusses the advantages that the use of continuous paramagnetic oxygen measurement brings to the process industry.

In many industries, oxygen serves as an important process gas. In the food industry, carbon dioxide or nitrogen is most commonly used as a protective gas in food packagings. For meat and sausages, however, the oxygen content in the packaging is as high as 80 percent, ensuring that the meat retains a pink colour that indicates freshness. In the metal industry, oxygen is combined with fuel gases such as acetylene for welding, cutting or melting metals. In steelworks, the gas is used to increase the combustion temperature, and in the medical sector, oxygen is used for ventilation, among other applications.

With so many possible uses, demand for oxygen is correspondingly high — in 2021, 57 industrial air separators in Germany produced around 6 billion cubic metres of oxygen. The air separators extract the oxygen from the surrounding air using membrane processes or the cryogenic Hampson-Linde cycle. In the Hampson-Linde cycle, the air is first liquefied before being separated into oxygen, nitrogen and noble gases. This distillation process must be metrologically controlled and monitored, as it is critical to the quality of the gases produced. If the process operates too quickly, the percentage of impurities in the oxygen, such as nitrogen or carbon dioxide, can increase. Moisture, hydrocarbons, ozone and corrosive components like sulphur or chlorine can also end up in the oxygen.