Special projects between Bavaria and Florida
Ingenieurwissenschaften
Hochschule Regensburg
Civil and Environmental Eng. Dept.
University of Central Florida
Risk acceptance criteria for existing oil and gas pipelines
Existing oil and gas pipelines represent a significant potential damage for humans and environment. Quantitative risk acceptance criteria for such important infrastructures are not directly addressed in current standards and recommendations. The research work will include: interpretation of reported accidental data in various regions, review of risk acceptance criteria in the offshore, chemical, transportation and nuclear industry, cost benefit analysis considerations for upgrading existing pipelines, classification of human and environmental consequences in case of accident, proposal of a risk acceptability matrix and of optimal risk reduction measures. Monitoring technologies for the damage potential of existing pipelines will be also explored.
Final report
The Bavarian Californian Technology Center BaCaTeC has sponsored during the year 2010 the cooperation between the civil engineering department of the University of Applied Sciences Regensburg and the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department of the University of Central Florida. The objective of the cooperation was the development of risk acceptance criteria for existing gas and oil pipelines.
Within the cooperation meetings were held and the following activities were undertaken:
- review of recent research work
- round table discussions with students
- information exchange regarding recent developments in European and American standards
- preparation of a common publication.
The following topics were thereby covered:
- Summary of standards
- Damage assessment
- Target reliability of existing structures
- Optimisation of risk acceptance criteria
Outcomes of the cooperation include target safety for existing structures and especially pipelines and associated requalification criteria. In addition project results especially in the field of risk acceptance are implemented in international committee work such as the work of ISO (International Standards Organisation) and JCSS (Joint Committee on Structural Safety).