• International Journal of Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering
• /
• v.7 no.3
• /
• pp.435-451
• /
• 2015

Evaluation of the performance of aging structures is essential in the oil and gas industry, where the inaccurate prediction of structural performance can have significantly hazardous consequences. The effects of structure failure due to the significant reduction in wall thickness, which determines the burst strength, make it very complicated for pipeline operators to maintain pipeline serviceability. In other words, the serviceability of gas pipelines and elbows needs to be predicted and assessed to ensure that the burst or collapse strength capacities of the structures remain less than the maximum allowable operation pressure. In this study, several positions of the corrosion in a subsea elbow made of API X42 steel were evaluated using both design formulas and numerical analysis. The most hazardous corrosion position of the aging elbow was then determined to assess its serviceability. The results of this study are applicable to the operational and elbow serviceability needs of subsea pipelines and can help predict more accurate replacement or repair times.

• Steel and Composite Structures
• /
• v.35 no.2
• /
• pp.171-186
• /
• 2020

This paper aims at providing insights on the use of thermosetting liner for the repair of offshore pipelines exposed to corrosion and leakage. The work which covers both experimental and numerical approaches were aspired due to the high cost of repair for pipelines, limitations of thermoplastic material and limited study of reinforced thermosetting liner. The experiment involves a destruction test called the burst test, carried out on an API 5L X42 carbon steel pipe under four case studies, namely (i) intact pipe, (ii) pipe with corrosion defect, (iii) pipe with corrosion defect and repaired with thermosetting liner and (iv) pipe with leakage and repaired with thermosetting liner. The numerical simulation was developed to first validate the experimental results and later to optimize the design of the thermosetting liner in terms of the number of layers required to restore the original strength of the pipe. The burst test shows an improvement in 23% of the burst capacity for the pipe with corrosion defects, after being repaired with a three-layer thermosetting liner. The parametric studies conducted showed that with an addition of thermosetting layers, the burst capacity improves by an average of 1.85 MPa. In conclusions, the improvement in strength can be further increased with increasing thickness of the thermosetting liner. The thermosetting liner was also determined to fail first inside the host pipe.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
• /
• v.32 no.3
• /
• pp.168-179
• /
• 2022

Microbiologically Influenced Corrosion (MIC) occurring in underground buried pipes of API 5L X65 steel was investigated. MIC is a corrosion phenomenon caused by microorganisms in soil; it affects steel materials in wet atmosphere. The microstructure and mechanical properties resulting from MIC were analyzed by OM, SEM/EDS, and mapping. Corrosion of pipe cross section was composed of ① surface film, ② iron oxide, and ③ surface/internal microbial corrosive by-product similar to surface corrosion pattern. The surface film is an area where concentrations of C/O components are on average 65 %/16 %; the main components of Fe Oxide were measured and found to be 48Fe-42O. The MIC area is divided into surface and inner areas, where high concentrations of N of 6 %/5 % are detected, respectively, in addition to the C/O component. The high concentration of C/O components observed on pipe surfaces and cross sections is considered to be MIC due to the various bacteria present. It is assumed that this is related to the heat-shrinkable sheet, which is a corrosion-resistant coating layer that becomes the MIC by-product component. The MIC generated on the pipe surface and cross section is inferred to have a high concentration of N components. High concentrations of N components occur frequently on surface and inner regions; these regions were investigated and Na/Mg/Ca basic substances were found to have accumulated as well. Therefore, it is presumed that the corrosion of buried pipes is due to the MIC of the NRB (nitrate reducing bacteria) reaction in the soil.