Abstract
This paper presents the first full-scale demonstration of the potential use of pipe/soil interaction-generated acoustic emission (AE) for early detection of buried pipe deformation. Full-scale tests were performed at the buried infrastructure research facility at Queen's University, Canada, using a split-box apparatus to impose differential ground motion on a steel pipe buried in dry sand, and to investigate the influence of stress level and patterns of deformation on AE generation. The pipe was instrumented with AE sensors, strain gauges, fibre optic strain sensing and linear potentiometers, and surface deformation was measured using an automatic total station. AE measurements were used to interpret the evolution of the pipe/soil interaction behaviour. AE activity correlated strongly (R2 from 0.83 to 0.99) with both the rate and magnitude of pipe deformation at different burial depths, and quantified relationships are presented that enable interpretation of pipe/soil interaction behavior from AE measurements.
Highlights
Pipeline networks cover vast geographical areas to transport water, oil and gas, and are critical lifelines upon which society heavily relies
The results from the differential ground motion experiments performed on buried full-scale steel pipes instrumented with Acoustic Emission (AE) sensors have demonstrated that the pipe/soil interactiongenerated AE is related to the stress level, bedding depth, the rate and magnitude of imposed deformation, and the evolution of the failure mechanism
AE generated by pipe/soil interaction has been investigated for the first time in full-scale differential ground movement experiments
Summary
Pipeline networks cover vast geographical areas to transport water, oil and gas, and are critical lifelines upon which society heavily relies. A significant proportion of these assets are buried in soil for protection and support; this exposes them to potential damage from ground movements. Buried pipelines experience significant strains in response to large soil shearing deformations (e.g. faulting, landslides and differential settlement), which can lead to tensile or buckling failure. Localised pipeline damage can have catastrophic economic, environmental and societal consequences, and the service of entire networks can be terminated (Karamitros et al 2007; Vazouras et al 2015; Robert et al 2016). Proportions of the energy dissipated during deformation of particle materials are converted to heat and sound. The high-frequency (>10 kHz) component of this sound energy is called Acoustic Emission (AE), which propagates through materials surrounding the generation source. Recent advances have been made in the interpretation of soil/structure interaction behavior from AE measurements using physical modelling and field experiments for slope instability (Smith et al 2014; Smith and Dixon 2015; Dixon et al 2015a; Dixon et al 2015b; Michlmayr et al 2017; Smith et al 2017a; Berg et al 2018; Dixon et al 2018) and pile loading (Mao et al 2015; Mao et al 2016; Mao et al 2018) applications
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