bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
The Effect of Ground Displacement and Stress Relief on Pipeline Behaviour: A Case Study
Authors: Karimian Hamid , Campbell Chris , Blackwell Chris , Dooley Colin , Barlow Pete 
Published: November 2018

The Wapiti River South Slope is located 25 km southwest of Grande Prairie, AB. The slope is 500 m long and consists of a steep lower slope and a shallower upper slope, both of which are located within a landslide complex with ground movements of varying magnitudes and depths. The Alliance Pipelines Ltd. (Alliance) NPS 42 Mainline (the pipeline) was installed in the winter of 2000 using conventional trenching techniques at an angle of approximately 8° to the slope fall line. Evidence of slope instability was observed in the slope since the first ground inspection in 2007. Review of the available geotechnical data indicates two different slide mechanisms. In the lower slope, there is a shallow translational slide within a colluvium layer that is draped over a stable bedrock formation. In the upper slope, there is a deep-seated translational slide within glaciolacustrine and glacial till deposits that are underlain by pre-glacial fluvial deposits. Both the upper and lower slope landslide mechanisms have been confirmed to be active in the past decade.
Large ground displacements in the order of several meters between 2012 and 2014 in the lower slope led to a partial stress relief and subsequent slope mitigation measures in the spring and summer of 2014, which significantly reduced the rate of ground movement in the lower slope. Surveying of the pipeline before and after stress relief indicated an increase in lateral pipeline deformation (in the direction of ground movement) following the stress relief. This observation was counter-intuitive and raised questions regarding the effectiveness of partial stress relief to reduce stresses and strains associated with ground movements.
Finite element analysis (FEA) was conducted in 2017 to aid in assessing the condition of the pipeline after being subject to the aforementioned activities, and subsequent ground displacement from July 2014 to December 2016. This paper presents the assumptions and results of the FEA model and discusses the effect of large ground displacement, subsequent stress relief and continued ground displacement on pipeline behaviour. The results and findings of the FEA reasonably match the observed pipeline behaviour before and after stress relief. The FEA results showed that while the lateral displacement of the pipeline that was caused by ground movement actually increased following the removal of the soil loading, the maximum pipeline strain was reduced in the excavated portion. The results also indicated that ground displacement in the upper slope following the stress relief had minimal effect on pipe stresses and strains in the lower slope.
An Analysis Model and its Practical Applications in PG&E Gas Transmission Pipeline Strength Test Projects
Authors: He Chunlei , Stracke Edward 
Published: November 2018

This article presents a complete set of calculations (referred to as Model) PG&E developed to monitor, assess and approve strength tests on insitu (pipelines currently in service) gas transmission pipelines. How the Model is used in the field, 2017 test results, and process improvements that resulted from the implementation of the model are also discussed.
In compliance with CPUC directives, the Code of Federal Regulations[1] and PG&E’s internal standards, PGE has performed strength tests on approximately 1,100 miles of insitu pipelines from 2011 through 2017. The model was specifically designed to assess the strength test of a closed section of gas pipeline for both leaks and ruptures.
The model was originally designed for strength tests using water as the test medium and updated to accommodate nitrogen as a test medium. A future enhancement will be to incorporate a blend of Nitrogen and Helium as the test medium. The model plots the pressure-temperature and pressure-volume curves over the test duration (field test measurements) and compares them to the theoretically calculated curves. The curves are used to determine if the change in pressure is due to temperature influence or leakage. When water is the test medium, the model calculates the net corrected medium volume change from start to end of the static test period. When nitrogen is the test medium, the model calculates and analyzes net mass change of the medium by considering nitrogen under both the real gas state and the ideal gas state.
By calculating restrained (buried) pipeline section and unrestrained (exposed) pipeline section separately, the model gains more accuracy. Accurate temperature measurements play a critical role in the model.
The model makes it possible for engineers to monitor, analyze and direct strength tests with real-time test data. The model is also used to evaluate the pipeline fill condition on the day prior to the actual test, which resulted in fewer test restarts due to incomplete fill or temperature stabilization issues. An additional benefit is the tests were typically completed earlier in the day. The model is utilized on all PG&E insitu pipeline strength projects today. Authors also provide improvement suggestions of this model in future application.
Comparison of Fracture Models to Quantify the Effects of Material Plasticity on the Ductile Fracture Propagation in Pipelines
Authors: Nonn Aida , Paredes Marcelo , Keim Vincent , Wierzbicki Tomasz 
Published: November 2018

Various numerical approaches have been developed in the last years aimed to simulate the ductile fracture propagation in pipelines transporting CO2 or natural gas. However, a reliable quantification of the influence of material plasticity on the fracture resistance is still missing. Therefore, more accurate description of the material plasticity on the ductile fracture propagation is required based on a suitable numerical methodology.
In this study, different plasticity and fracture models are compared regarding the ductile fracture propagation in X100 pipeline steel with the objective to quantify the influence of plasticity parameters on the fracture resistance. The plastic behavior of the investigated material is considered by the quadratic yield surface in conjunction with a non-associated quadratic plastic flow potential. The strain hardening can be appropriately described by the mixed Swift-Voce law. The simulations of ductile fracture are conducted by an uncoupled, modified Mohr-Coulomb (MMC) and the micromechanically based Gurson-Tvergaard-Needleman (GTN) models. In contract to the original GTN model, the MMC model is capable of describing ductile failure over wide range of stress states. Thus, ductile fracture resistance can be estimated for various load and fracture scenarios. Both models are used for the simulation of fracture propagation in DWTT and 3D pressurized pipe sections. The results from the present work can serve as a basis for establishing the correlation between plasticity parameters and ductile fracture propagation.
Analysis of the National Energy Board Pipeline Integrity Performance Measures Data
Authors: Paviglianiti Joe , Shaw Sarah 
Published: November 2018

The National Energy Board’s (NEB or the Board) top priorities are the safety of people and protection of the environment. NEB-regulated pipelines have a very good safety record; however, the NEB noticed an increased trend in some types of incidents. Therefore, after considerable stakeholder consultation, in March 2012 the NEB started requiring NEB-regulated companies to report annually on new pipeline performance measures. These performance measures were developed and introduced to promote continual improvement in the management of pipelines by allowing companies to compare their results with industry aggregate numbers. In addition, these metric results allow the NEB to both evaluate and demonstrate that pipeline companies are effective in managing pipeline safety and protection of the environment.
The NEB requires all regulated companies to report on incidents, such as releases of substances and serious injuries. Pipeline performance measures data provides the Board additional information such as lagging and leading indicators. These lagging indicators provide an historical view of company performance while the leading indicators provide forward looking data of potential future events. The NEB is of the view that an amalgamation of leading, lagging and qualitative measures can provide an overview of company effectiveness in meeting foundational management system program objectives.
This paper examines four years of reported integrity related performance and integrity inspection data to evaluate trends in activities taken by companies to maintain safe pipelines. This paper will briefly discuss the challenges encountered when developing the measures, obtaining consistent data and evaluation of the data to identify trends.
The paper will conclude by summarizing select results of the integrity performance measures and integrity inspection information data and discuss any potential future actions related to the pipeline performance integrity measures.
Overcoming Difficult to Inspect Multi-Diameter, Low Pressure Gas Transmission Pipeline Challenges
Authors: Dauby Frank , Vages Stefan 
Published: November 2018

Pacific Gas and Electric Company owns and operates an extensive network of over 10,700 km (6,700 miles) of gas transmission pipelines, much of which is under 16″ diameter and operates at less than 27.5 bar (400 psig), making them difficult to inspect with free swimming in-line inspection (ILI) tools. Additionally, many piggable pipeline sections are multi-diameter and have numerous 1.5D fittings, some of these in back to back configuration, requiring tools that are not currently available. Following several failed attempts to inspect PG&E’s 12″ × 16″ pipelines in 2015 using existing ILI tools, and after working to modify a 12″ × 18″ tool for lower pressure service in 2016, PG&E and ROSEN decided to collaboratively develop new, specially designed, 12″ × 16″ geometry and axial MFL tools.
The goal of this project was to develop tools that could meet both the PG&E pipeline passage requirements and allow for an acceptable speed profile. The need to inspect a total of 16 pipeline sections in the long-term ILI Upgrade Plan, in this size range, justified the investment in these new tools. The service provider embarked on a new ILI tool design process including design, manufacturing, fabrication and testing at their facilities in Germany. Through this process, a number of unique ILI tool design features to lower tool drag and improve ease of collapsibility were implemented, resulting in a tool that far exceeds existing industry capabilities. To confirm the tools’ capabilities before their first use in a live gas transmission pipeline, pump testing in water, as well as in compressed air, was performed. In late 2017, using these tools, PG&E inspected two previously unpiggable 12″ × 16″ low-pressure pipelines successfully. In this paper, the process of developing these tools will be discussed. The test program will be reviewed comparing findings under controlled conditions in water and compressed air with pig run behavior in the live pipelines. The analysis also provides an assessment of the operating conditions that are deemed necessary for the inspection tool to gather a good quality data set.
Algorithms for the Strain Based Analysis of Dented Pipelines
Authors: Okoloekwe Chike , Kainat Muntaseer , Langer Doug , Hassanien Sherif , Adeeb Samer 
Published: November 2018

Pipeline integrity management commonly leverages nondestructive inspection of pipeline defects via inline inspection (ILI) and assessment of the resultant data. Key parameters for dent analysis include the feature geometry measured by caliper tools and the presence/severity of any interacting features (such as cracks or areas of corrosion) which can be measured with a variety of technologies (such as magnetic flux leakage or ultrasonic tools). Dent profile measurements can be especially susceptible to noise due to the measurement techniques employed, signal quality, and overall tool performance. Analytical methods for strain assessment of dents can employ curve/surface fitting techniques to estimate the curvature and calculate the strain of the dent based on the fitted curve/surface. Noise in the measured profile can result in local areas of high perceived strain, which could lead to misinterpretation of a dent’s true severity, especially when using automated or purely analytical assessment methods.
A deterministic strain-based approach for evaluating the severity of dented pipelines has been presented previously which leverages multi-dimensional B-spline functions to more accurately apply the non-mandatory ASME B31.8 equations for dent assessment. The approach presented previously requires relatively smooth dent profile information to minimize the effects of signal noise. While low pass filters can effectively eliminate noise in the signal, they may also lead to loss of accuracy (e.g. excessive smoothing can reduce the depth and sharpness of a measured dent’s profile). This paper discusses how low pass filters can be optimally used to smooth the raw ILI signals to allow for analytical representation of the dent shape without underestimating its severity.
The conclusion of this venture is a detailed workflow for the analytical assessment of dented pipelines for the rapid characterization of the severity of deformation in pipelines with limited computational demand. This type of assessment allows for initial ranking and assessment of large and complex pipeline systems to select features requiring more detailed assessment or mitigation.
Landslide Pipe-Soil Interaction: State of the Practice
Authors: Eichhorn Geoffrey N. , Haigh Stuart K. 
Published: November 2018

Current understanding of pipe-soil interaction during large ground movement events is insufficient due to their infrequency and the complexity of the infrastructure. Pipeline operators currently rely on a fully coupled continuum model of a landslide and pipeline interaction, or, more commonly, on a simplification of this interface using structural beam style soil-springs to transfer soil loads and displacements to the pipeline.
The basis for soil-springs are laboratory studies based largely on clean sand or pure clay, and flat ground. Owing to the use of manufactured soils and flat ground, the soil-pipe interface modelling may not be valid for landslides.
The loading of a pipeline in a landslide, and how the soil-spring factors should change with space and time are reviewed and may differ from commonly adopted guidelines. Physical modelling in research is emerging to study landslides and pipelines utilizing fully instrumented scale models. In the absence of fully instrumented field pipelines, physical modelling should be used to validate continuum models.
Integrity of Longitudinal Welds in Pipelines: Bridging Scales
Authors: Erdelen-Peppler Marion , Kalwa Christoph , Schröder Jens 
Published: November 2018

Toughness testing of the heat affected zone (HAZ) of longitudinal welds is increasingly often required in pipeline standards and specifications. This includes simple tests such as the Charpy impact test that was designed to serve as quality test as well as enhanced methods including crack tip opening displacement (CTOD) tests that are necessary to conduct an engineering critical assessment (ECA). If occasional low toughness values are observed, the question turns towards assessing the impact of such numbers and how representative they are of the behavior of a pipe in service. The significance of low toughness values measured in laboratory testing can be judged on basis of ring expansion and hydraulic burst tests.
The current study summarises an extensive test series to quantify the toughness of submerged arc welds (SAW) obtained by different test methods. The tested pipes cover a wide range of material including medium strength X70 up to high strength X100. Their welds are characterized in terms of fracture toughness properties with single edge notch tension (SENT) and single edge notch bending (SENB) tests. Different constraint levels are obtained within each series by introducing notches of standard depth as well as shallow notches. Structural behavior is characterized with burst tests as well as ring expansion tests containing notches in the longitudinal weld.
The experimental results are assessed within dedicated finite element studies. The assessment is conducted for pipes serving as pressure containment, thus having circumferential stress resulting from internal pressure. Based on the results achieved the conclusion can be drawn that the standard route including high constraint CTOD leads to overly conservative results concerning the integrity of longitudinal welds. A better representation of structural behavior is observed in ring expansion tests.
Application of Wide-Band Ultrasound for the Detection of Angled Crack Features in Oil and Gas Pipelines
Authors: Vos Willem , Norli Petter , Vallee Emilie 
Published: November 2018

This paper describes a novel technique for the detection of cracks in pipelines. The proposed in-line inspection technique has the ability to detect crack features at random angles in the pipeline, such as axial, circumferential, and any angle in between. This ability is novel to the current ILI technology offering and will also add value by detecting cracks in deformed pipes (i.e. in dents), and cracks associated with the girth weld (mid weld cracks, rapid cooling cracks and cracks parallel to the weld). Furthermore, the technology is suitable for detection of cracks in spiral welded pipes, both parallel to the spiral weld as well as perpendicular to the weld. Integrity issues around most features described above are not addressed with ILI tools, often forcing operators to perform hydrostatic tests to ensure pipeline safety.
The technology described here is based on the use of wideband ultrasound inline inspection tools that are already in operation. They are designed for the inspection of structures operating in challenging environments such as offshore pipelines. Adjustments to the front-end analog system and data collection from a grid of transducers allow the tools to detect cracks in any orientation in the line. Description of changes to the test set-up are presented as well as the theoretical background behind crack detection.
Historical development of the technology will be presented, such as early laboratory testing and proof of concept. The proof of concept data will be compared to the theoretical predictions. A detailed set of results are presented. These are from tests that were performed on samples sourced from North America and Europe which contain SCC features. Results from ongoing testing will be presented, which involved large-scale testing on SCC features in gas-filled pipe spools.
CO2SAFE-ARREST: A Full-Scale Burst Test Research Program for Carbon Dioxide Pipelines — Part 3: Dispersion Modelling
Authors: Godbole Ajit , Liu Xiong , Michal Guillaume , Lu Cheng , Huéscar Medina Clara 
Published: November 2018

The ‘CO2SafeArrest’ Joint Industry Project (JIP) was set up with the twin aims of: (1) investigating the fracture propagation and arrest characteristics of steel pipelines carrying anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2), and (2) investigating the dispersion of CO2 following its release into the atmosphere. The project involves two full-scale burst tests of 24-inch, X65 buried line pipes filled with a mixture of CO2 and nitrogen (N2). An overview of the CO2SafeArrest JIP and details of the fracture propagation and arrest investigation appear elsewhere in two companion papers.
This paper presents the experimental investigation and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations of the dispersion of CO2 following its explosive release into the atmosphere over the terrain at the test site in the first test.
The setting up of the experiment and the CFD model is described in detail, including the representation of terrain topography and weather (wind) conditions, and the condition at the ‘inlet to the dispersion domain’. The modelling was carried out prior to the actual event, and simulated the dispersion of the CO2 cloud for different wind speeds and directions. This analysis confirmed that the sensor layout set up to obtain spot measurements CO2 concentration over the terrain at the site was adequate.
The predicted and experimental values of CO2 concentration at the nominated locations over the duration of the dispersion were found to be in good agreement. Results of this study are expected to be used in developing a generalized model for the dispersion of CO2 and for estimating the ‘consequence distance’ for such events. It is noted that this distance is necessarily a function of time due to the highly transient nature of the event.
Complex Circumferential Stress Corrosion Cracking: Identification, Sizing and Consequences for the Integrity Management Program
Authors: Johnson Brett , Tesfaye Bereket , Wargacki Cory , Hennig Thomas , Suarez Ernesto 
Published: November 2018

Since the late 1980’s Ultrasonic tools have been used for the detection and sizing of crack like indications. ILI service providers developed inspection technologies for liquid and gas lines that are widely used nowadays. In comparison to axial cracking, circumferential cracking is not a prevalent risk to most pipelines and therefore is not as well understood. Nevertheless, pipeline Operators observe from time to time circumferentially oriented defects, often in combination with circumferential welds or local stress/strain accumulations. These are often caused by pipeline movement, which may especially occur in mountain areas.
With the introduction of Ultrasonic circumferential crack inspection tools in the late 2000’s the knowledge has steadily increased over time. Extensive data collected from in-ditch NDE validations has provided NDT Global with an increased knowledge of the morphology of single cracking and stress corrosion cracking defects both in the axial and circumferential orientations. Field verifications have shown that not all features have the same morphology. Some of the challenges with circumferential cracking are for features that fall outside of the industry standard specifications. These types of features can exhibit characteristics such as being sloped, skewed or tilted. In 2016 NDT Global was approached by Plains Midstream Canada to complete inspections utilizing the 10″ Ultrasonic Circumferential crack inspection technology. The pipeline system spans 188km within Canada and consists of 2 segments. The pipeline traverses several elevation changes and crosses several creeks and roads. Circumferential cracking was identified during dig campaigns performed for other threats, therefore the need to inspect each pipeline segment with the Ultrasonic circumferential technology was identified.
Plains Midstream Canada and NDT Global formed a close collaboration to assess the severity of circumferential crack features in this line. This paper will discuss integrity aspects from an Operator and Vendor perspective. Challenges identified due to the morphology of the circumferential crack like indications and derived analysis rules and interpretation methodologies to optimize characterization and sizing are presented. Finally, potential opportunities to maintain the integrity of similar assets by applying some of the findings and enhance the management and decision making process are suggested.