This paper describes an Internal Corrosion Direct Assessment (ICDA) protocol carried out for a “piggable” Kuwaiti crude oil pipeline in compliance with NACE SP0208-2008. A 914.4 mm (36 in) × 25 km pipeline (CR088) transports Ratawi/Burgan crude oil a distance of 25 kilometers. It consists of three pipeline regions as defined within SP0208-2008 (with two of the three pipeline regions containing three pipeline subregions), where the three regions were operated with a different flow rate and/or pipeline diameter and BS&W amount under two discrete time eras. The pipeline was commissioned in 2005 and had been inspected in 2009 using ultrasonic In-Line Inspection (UT-ILI) tools. During the indirect inspection phase of ICDA, several internal corrosion locations were predicted (and subsequently confirmed during the Direct Examination phase or step) which conjointly, may be attributable to CO2 partial pressure, H2S content, crude flow rate, operating temperature, inorganic halides, deposited solids, bacteria, and aerated conditions. To identify the root causes for the presence of the internal corrosion threat and remedial measures required to mitigate problems going forward, the contributing consulting engineers used their proprietary in-house internal corrosion prediction model to conduct the analysis. Additionally, a comparison to predicted corrosion rates with those collected earlier from the UT smart pig run are discussed. Although this new piggable pipeline had already been inspected by UT pigging, assessment of ICDA-LP for this crude line has provided the operator with a practical internal corrosion mitigation plan to further reduce and control the risk for future internal corrosion.
The Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) a CR088 pipeline was commissioned in 2004 for transporting export quality crude oil from the manifold M/F TB-1 to their North Tank Farm (NTF) with a length over a distance of 25 kilometers.
