Fibre optic
Dr. Chris Minto and Dr. Alastair Godfrey,
OptaSense, UK,
discuss new developments
in pipeline integrity maintenance.
P
ipeline cleaning and inspection
operations are an essential component
of any pipeline maintenance regime.
However, until recently, the process
has been completely opaque to any live
analysis. Instead, the detritus – weighed by
passive devices – is checked after each run
and trended. Any detailed information on
the status is set aside until (the less frequent)
intelligent inspection devices have been run.
This way the information can be compared
over much longer timescales, including the
specific location of defects or highlighted areas
of concern.
Although providing immensely detailed
output, such operations are not without their
issues – device positions are estimated on
dead reckoning principles with no external
input, and constrained to operate within a
mandated speed regime that is only possible to
assess after the event.
is here
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