Current Challenges – Overview

O&G Pipe lines are laid underground or above ground in kms of length. The pipe line carries costly and hazardous fuels with high pressure. Small cracks, corrosion causes leakage in the pipe line which may incur loss to the Company and at the same time may have huge loss on environment / human hazards.

As a part of Integrity management of these pipelines, the foot patrolling of ROU (Right of use) of the pipeline needs to be monitored to avoid any Third party activity resulting into leak or fire.

The ROU monitoring activity is set on the basis of class location(population zones) through which pipe line is passing.

Based on the current scenarios, O&G companies are making physical survey of the system at the Test Lead Points for pipeline corrosion monitoring installed @ 1-1.5 km distance near Pipe line path and Right of Use (ROU) for physical condition monitoring of pipeline.

Manual survey are being carried out at different time interval monthly or bi-monthly on 200 to 400 km of distance and report are to be fed into the existing software by surveyor.

The foot patrolling will be on Daily & Monthly basis as required.

Typical areas where the monitoring has been done manually and cause the chances of errors:

• Line Patrol Man (LPM) should observe soil/ground surface condition on and adjacent to Pipeline /ROU (right of Use) area, indication of leak/construction activity other than company, encroachment and any other factors/activities affecting the safety and security of pipeline like Digging/Drilling/Boring/HDD etc. Patrolman will have to pay special attention to all Railway / Bridge / Road / River / Canal/Nala crossings.
• If any serious observation / abnormality is found which may be required to be reported immediately, along with photograph & location details.
• Any de-coloration of vegetation on the ROU is to be reported to investigate possible leak Each LPM shall keep their GPS tracking device always in charged and ON condition to monitor via GPS tracking portal.
• Deep rooted trees which are considered threat to the pipeline shall be reported to Local Control Room along with detailed information including photograph
• All vulnerable locations viz. river crossings, all cased Road / Railway / canal crossings, Encroachments, Excavation, Exposure, washout shall be checked with special care and to be reported with photograph
• Reporting on all activities being carried out on the ROU like, excavation, digging, construction, encroachment, exposure, wash out, plantation, leak, soil erosion etc.