The buckling of submarine pipelines may occur due to the action of axial soil frictional force caused by relative movement of soil and pipeline, which is induced by the thermal and internal pressure. The likelihood of occurrence of this buckling phenomenon is largely determined by soil resistance. A series of large-scale model tests were carried out to facilitate the establishment of substantial data base for a variety of burial pipeline relationships. Based on the test data, nonlinear soil spring can be adopted to simulate the soil behavior during the pipeline movement. For uplift resistance, an ideal elasticity plasticity model is recommended in the case of H/D (depth-to-diameter ratio)>5 and an elasticity softened model is recommended in the case of H/D≤5. The soil resistance along the pipeline axial direction can be simulated by an ideal elasticity plasticity model. The numerical analyzing results show that the capacity of pipeline against thermal buckling decreases with its initial imperfection enlargement and increases with the burial depth enhancement.
In this paper,a theoretical solution of vertical buckling is proposed with regard to the typical initial imperfection cases of submarine pipelines.Analytical tools are applied to predicting the occurrence and consequence of inservice buckling of a buried heated pipeline in Bohai Gulf.An evaluation is performed to ensure the pipeline structural integrity during operation under loading conditions.Different protection measures are proposed and their validities are analyzed.Analyses show that for the same magnitude of initial imperfection,the upheaval buckling of pipeline with isolated prop model is the most likely to occur.The empathetic model represents a special sub-case of continuous prop model,and the calculated buckle temperature is between the first stage and the second stage of post-upheaval buckling of continuous prop model.And the larger the initial imperfection,the less the axial force required for the upheaval buckling.Meanwhile,it can be seen that a peak point appears on the curves of temperature difference against buckling amplitude for small initial imperfection.Besides,trenching-burial is one kind of protection measures preventing the pipeline from thermal upheaval.The covered depth-to-diameter ratio depends on the design conditions and subsoil properties.For the given pipeline in this paper,the covered depth-to-diameter ratio is recommended to be 5.
It is of importance to study and predict the possible buckling of submarine pipeline under thermal stress in pipeline design.Since soil resistance is not strong enough to restrain the large deformation of pipeline,high-order buckling modes occur very easily.Analytical solutions to high-order buckling modes were obtained in this paper.The relationships between buckling temperature and the amplitude or the wavelength of buckling modes were established.Analytical solutions were obtained to predict the occurrence and consequence of in-service buckling of a heated pipeline in an oil field.The effects of temperature difference and properties of subsoil on buckling modes were investigated.The results show that buckling will occur once temperature difference exceeds safe temperature;high-order pipeline buckling occurs very easily;the larger the friction coefficients are,the safer the submarine pipeline will be.
In order to avoid the curing effects of paraffin on the transport process and reduce the transport difficulty,usually high temperature and high pressure are used in the transportation of oil and gas.The differences of temperature and pressure cause additional stress along the pipeline,due to the constraint of the foundation soil,the additional stress can not release freely,when the additional stress is large enough to motivate the submarine pipelines buckle.In this work,the energy method is introduced to deduce the analytical solution which is suitable for the global buckling modes of idealized subsea pipeline and analyze the relationship between the critical buckling temperature,buckling length and amplitude under different high-order global lateral buckling modes.To obtain a consistent formulation of the problem,the principles of virtual displacements and the variation calculus for variable matching points are applied.The finite element method based on elasto-plastic theory is used to simulate the lateral global buckling of the pipelines under high temperature and pressure.The factors influencing the lateral buckling of pipelines are further studied.Based upon some actual engineering projects,the finite element results are compared with the analytical ones,and then the influence of thermal stress,the section rigidity of pipeline,the soil properties and the trigging force to the high order lateral buckling are discussed.The method of applying the small trigging force on pipeline is reliable in global buckling numerical analysis.In practice,increasing the section rigidity of a pipeline is an effective measure to improve the ability to resist the global buckling.
Buckling of submarine pipelines under thermal stress is one of the most important problems to be considered in pipeline design. And pipeline with initial imperfections will easily undergo failure due to global buckling under thermal stress and internal pressure. Therefore, it is vitally important to study the global buckling of the submarine pipeline with initial imperfections. On the basis of the characteristics of the initial imperfections, the global lateral buckling of submarine pipelines was analyzed. Based on the deduced analytical solutions for the global lateral buckling, effects of temperature difference and properties of foundation soil on pipeline buckling were analyzed. The results show that the snap buckling is predominantly governed by the amplitude value of initial imperfection; the triggering temperature difference of Mode I for pipelines with initial imperfections is higher than that of Mode II; a pipeline with a larger friction coefficient is safer than that with a smaller one; pipelines with larger initial imperfections are safer than those with smaller ones.
In-service hydrocarbons must be transported at high temperature and high pressure to ease the flow and prevent the solidification of the wax fraction. The pipeline containing hot oil will expand longitudinally due to the rise in temperature. If such expansion is resisted, for example by frictional effects over a kilometer or so of pipeline, compressive axial stress will be built up in the pipe-wall. The compressive forces are often so large that they induce vertical buckling of buried pipelines, which can jeopardize the structural integrity of the pipeline. A typical initial imperfection named continuous support mode of submarine pipeline was studied. Based on this type of initial imperfection, the analytical solution of vertical thermal buckling was introduced and an elastic-plasticity finite element analysis (FEA) was developed. Both the analytical and the finite element methodology were applied to analyze a practice in Bohai Gulf, China. The analyzing results show that upheaval buckling is most likely to build up from the initial imperfection of the pipeline and the buckling temperature depends on the amplitude of initial imperfection. With the same amplitude of initial imperfection, the triggering temperature difference of upheaval buckling increases with covered depth of the pipeline, the soil strength and the friction between the pipeline and subsoil.
