A New Risk-based Excavation Inspection Decision-making for Long-distance Pipelines

Abstract

With the number of long-distance pipelines increasing in China,the excavation inspection and maintenance is the most important means to avoid the leakage of pipeline. However, the current excavation and maintenance decision-making models are absent to make satisfying results based on the comprehensive data of pipeline. To address this problem, a new quantitative risk-based model is proposed to guide decision-making on excavation inspection and maintenance. Based on previous failure cases, the model includes data about the surrounding soils as well as about the pipeline’s protective layer, cathodic protection and thickness readings. Case of the proposed model on previous failure cases shows that the new model can correctly predict a rational excavation inspection and maintenance span for a long-distance pipeline during its whole service life.