The interaction of grounded ice features with higher with underlying seabed is one of the major considerations in the design of Arctic pipeline systems. Regarding the to the construction of arctic offshore pipelines. development of offshore gas fields near Sakhalin Island, which is an ice-infested area, in this paper an ice scour Ice scour model to determine the subsea pipeline burial depth is According to field observation data, ice scour model to determine the subsea pipeline burial depth is studied. Using a simplified ice-seabed interaction process, ice scour depth is easily calculated. This numerical model can simulate the scouring process for various environmental parameters such as ice mass, incoming velocity, soil strength etc. The paper also deals with various interacting forces during the scouring process and discusses ice loads which are transmitted to seabed.
Ice scour or ice grounded phenomenon is often found in Arctic seas, especially in the shallow coastal regions of water depth less than 30m. During spring seasons, massive ice features such as icebergs or pressure ridges drift and gouge the shallow seabed. The interaction of grounded ice with underlying seabed is a very important design factor for the Arctic pipeline systems. During the ice scour process the force exerted by the ice features on seabed is much greater than the strength of pipelines, hence severe damage may occur to pipelines. In the sense of pipeline's safety, the best way to avoid direct contact with ice is to bury pipelines inside seabed trenches. Pipelines should be buried beneath the maximum scour depth, but the cost for trenching goes higher with increasing pipeline burial depths. Hence it is necessary to estimate the ice scour depth correctly prior to the construction of Arctic offshore pipelines.
