Effect of temperature rise on the mechanical behaviour of deep-sea clay surrounding oil and gas pipelines

Abstract

The mechanical behaviour of deep-sea clay is crucial for oil and gas pipeline safety and is traditionally assessed through in situ penetration testing, which is usually conducted in a low-temperature environment (usually at temperatures lower than 4 °C). However, the temperature of deep-sea clay surrounding high-temperature pipelines can reach approximately 20 °C. To date, the influence of temperature variation on the mechanical properties of deep-sea clay, especially strain-softening behaviour, has been largely overlooked, posing a safety risk to practical engineering. Consequently, this study first establishes a temperature-controlled cyclic penetration testing platform. Then, an enhanced mini-spherical penetrometer is employed to investigate the undrained strength and strain-softening behaviour of undisturbed deep-sea clay samples at 4 °C, 10 °C and 20 °C. In particular, an improved framework is proposed to quantitatively characterize the mechanical behaviour. Finally, a strain-softening law considering temperature variations is established and rigorously validated through in situ tests. The findings underscore several significant observations: (a) deep-sea clay in its intact state exhibits a heightened sensitivity to temperature variations compared to that in its remoulded state; (b) temperature variations influence the strain-softening parameters of deep-sea clay, resulting in distinct behaviours; and (c) the proposed strain-softening law considering temperature variations is verified to be more logical.