Development of Third-Party Damage Monitoring System for Natural Gas Pipeline

Abstract

In this paper, we develop a real time monitoring system to detect third-party damage on natural gas pipeline. When the damage due to third-party incidents causes an immediate rupture, the developed on-line monitoring system can help reducing the sequences of event at once. Moreover, since many third-party incidents cause damage that does not lead to immediate rupture but can grow with time, the developed on-line monitoring system can execute a significant role in reducing many third-party damage incidents. Also, when the damage is given at a point on natural gas pipeline, the acoustic wave is propagated very fast about 421.3 m/s. Therefore, the data processing time should be very short in order to detect precisely the impact position. Generally, the pipeline is laid under ground or sea and the length is very long. So a wireless data communication method is recommendable and the sensing positions are limited by laid circumstance and setting cost of sensors. The calculation and monitoring software is developed by an algorithm using the propagation speed of acoustic wave and data base system based on wireless communication and DSP systems. The developed monitoring system is examined by field testing at Balan pilot plant, KOGAS being done in order to demonstrate its validity through reactive detection of third-party contact with pipelines. Furthermore, the development system was set at the practical pipelines such as an offshore pipeline between two islands Yul-Do and Youngjong-Do, and a land branch of Pyoungtaek, Korea and it has been operating in real time.