The design and construction of a large-diameter crude oil pipeline in Northeastern China presented unique scientific and engineering problems. Geohazards resulting from the (differential) frost heaving and thaw settlement of the pipeline foundation soils present one of the most daunting tasks.
The design and construction of a large-diameter crude oil pipeline in Northeastern China presented unique scientific and engineering problems. Geohazards resulting from the (differential) frost heaving and thaw settlement of the pipeline foundation soils present one of the most daunting tasks.
The design and construction of a large-diameter crude oil pipeline in Northeastern China presented unique scientific and engineering problems. Geohazards resulting from the (differential) frost heaving and thaw settlement of the pipeline foundation soils present one of the most daunting tasks.
Design and construction of a large-diameter crude oil pipeline in Northeastern China:
A special issue on permafrost pipeline Huijun Jin State Key Laboratory of Frozen Soils Engineering, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou 730000, China a b s t r a c t a r t i c l e i n f o Keywords: Crude oil pipeline Modied conventional burial Warm permafrost Northeastern China Forests and wetlands Frost hazards and mitigative measures The design and building of a pipeline in permafrost regions challenge engineers and scientists in many regards, and the geohazards resulting from the (differential) frost heaving and thaw settlement of the pipeline foundation soils present one of the most daunting tasks. The ChinaRussia Crude Oil Pipeline, a spur line from the SiberiaPacic Pipeline System, presented unique scientic and engineering problems because of: 1) extensive presence of the more ice-rich permafrost in boreal forests and swamps; 2) an insistence on a buried construction mode because of concerns about the potential for frequent forest res and other safety issues; 3) great uncertainties in the temperatures of oil being transported although the given estimated oil temperature of 6.4 to +3.6 C entering the Mo'he Pump Station, and the estimated oil temperatures could vary from about 6 to +10 C along the southward pipeline route; 4) the limited lead time for detailed surveys on engineering geology along the pipeline routes and for engineering design; 5) very much limited investment and a limited number of engineers experienced in designing and building a major pipeline in an area where about one-half of its length would be impacted by generally warm (3 to 0 C) permafrost. Nevertheless, the pipeline engineers and permafrost scientists strived to economically build and satisfactorily operate the rst major crude oil pipeline in the boreal ecosystem in China. The major results on the formation mechanisms and mitigative measures for the (differential) frost heave and thaw settlement were presented in the eight papers in this special issue on permafrost pipeline, and one additional paper on the GolmudLhasa Oil Products Pipeline on the QinghaiTibet Plateau was also included. They may provide insights to the understanding of pipelinepermafrost interactions and benet the future design and construction of pipelines in similar northern environments. 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The ChinaRussia Crude Oil Pipeline (CRCOP) was rst proposed as early as 1994 as a spur line of the SiberiaPacic Oil Pipeline Systemto supply crude oil for China from Siberia, Russia. However, the pipeline was subjected to many changes of plans and designs, particularly the stakeholders, pipeline routes, and transportation modes. Among which, the most signicant change involved in the rerouting of the pipeline more downstreamof the Lena River in order to better protect the sensitive ecological environments in the Baikal Lake regions. As a result, the CRCOP was also rerouted from its original Hailar to Daqing route to the nal route starting from Skovorodino, Russia, via Mo'he, China, to Daqing, China (Fig. 1). Three alternative routes were originally proposed for the CRCOP. The middle line (Ta'he route) was nally selected. The routing adopted for the CRCOP correctly traversed the permafrost zones as expeditiously as possible in a generally north to south direction in order to minimize the freezing/thawing problems. This was possible because, although inactive ice wedges were identied at similar latitudes in Northeastern China (Yang and Jin, in press), the route survey and the historical data acquired had reported no near-surface buried ice wedges or lenses whose thawing might produce signicant differential settlement over short distances and possible rupture of the pipeline. That problem had forced the Alyeska pipeline to employ an elevated mode of construction over about 53% of its total length. The survey also reported areas of ice-rich permafrost whose thawing and settlement might result in occasionally unacceptable sags and tension forces in the pipeline, but it would appear that frost heave could be the main soil foundation problem encountered on the CRCOP. Tremendous forces are generated when a section of the pipeline route has an excess of moisture, which freezes more slowly than the surrounding materials, heaving upwards as the lesser resisting direction as the balance of the moisture freezes, in spite of the contravening forces of contraction in the pipeline itself. This route also is easier to build and traverses lesser extents of natural reserves for forests, wetlands, rare and endangered species, as well as key water resources areas along the Nen River for the Songhua and Nen Rivers Plain. This route is also relatively richer in engineering geological and permafrost data, and consequently less costly. Cold Regions Science and Technology 64 (2010) 209212 E-mail address: hjjin@lzb.ac.cn. 0165-232X/$ see front matter 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.coldregions.2010.04.016 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Cold Regions Science and Technology j our nal homepage: www. el sevi er. com/ l ocat e/ col dr egi ons The CRCOP route from Skovorodino to Daqing is 1030 km, almost straight from north to south, in which it is 953 km from Mo'he at the southern bank of the HeilongAmur River serving as the ChinaRussia border, to Daqing on the northern SonghuaNen Rivers Plain (Fig. 1). The pipeline is nalized at 813 mm (32 in.) in diameter and the designed annual throughput is 15 million tons of crude oil (or 600,000 bpd) at the operation pressure of 8 MPa (occasionally to 10 MPa at certainportions) during the rst termin20102030. Most of the pipeline design and construction adopted a modied conventional burial at a nominal depth of 1.5 m, and the estimated oil temperatures at the Mo'he Inlet will be about 6.4 to +3.6 C, and the estimated temperatures of oil ows along the CRCOP route during the next 50 years will vary from6 to +10 C taking into account of abrasion heating of oil ows along the pipe wall and temperature increase through pump stations (Li et al., 2010a). The active construction startedon18 May 2009, and it was designedto be completed inAugust 2010, and the formal operation is to begin on 1 October 2010. The northern part of the CRCOP travels 441 km in the regions affected by the Xing'anBaikal type of permafrost, which is charac- terized by largely latitudinal permafrost, better developed permafrost in the lower elevations such as intermontane basins and lowlands, strongly inuenced by local factors, such as ground surface vegetative coverage of snow cover, forest and wetlands canopies, and atmo- spheric temperature inversions (Jin et al., 2007, 2010). The warm (N1 C) permafrost accounts for 275 km, or about 62% of the permafrost zones along the pipeline route, and the ice-rich, warm permafrost accounts for 119 km, or about 27% of the permafrost zones along the pipeline route. The transition zones of isolated patchy and sporadic permafrost and taliks are as wide as 300 km, and 83 transitions of permafrost and seasonally frozen ground or taliks were identied. In addition, about 50 km of the pipeline needs to be buried in wetlands with marginal permafrost, and most of the pipeline route in permafrost regions is forested. In the south, the pipeline traverses 512 km of the areas affected by deep (N1.5 m) seasonally frozen ground in the piedmonts of the Da Xiang'anling Mountains and on the northern SonghuaNen Rivers Plain, with rich ne-grained soils, generally high ground water tables, and frequently encountered wetlands. The route is subject to both winter and summer extremes of temperature, high winds and drifted snow, avalanches, and spring ooding conditions. Therefore, the geohazards resulting from (differential) frost heave and thaw settlement of the foundations soils of the pipeline and its associated infrastructures are very signicant, and surveys, design, and construction of the CRCOP must be detailed in many aspects. This special issue on the pipelines in permafrost regions includes eight papers. Jin et al. (2010) mainly assessed frozen-ground conditions for engineering geology along the CRCOP. It was based on extensive eld investigations and surveys. Li et al. (2010a, 2010b) and Zhang et al. (2010) presented their thermal analysis on the interactions between pipeline and frozen ground. The situations along the pipeline route and during the next 50 years were taken into account. Wen et al. (2010) and Wu et al. (2010) presented their strain/stress analysis and the interpretations on the formation and mitigative mechanisms of (differential) frost heave and thaw settlement of pipeline foundation soils. Xu et al. (2010) conducted and analyzed the results of the 1:8 scale model test. Yang et al. (2010) provided discussions on environmental hazards and contingency plans and on the mitigative techniques and monitoring and evaluation systems for thermal and moisture regimes, deformation and stresses of pipeline foundation soils. Additionally, He and Jin (2010) presented a paper on the permafrost and cold regions environmental problems of the GolmudLhasa oil product pipeline and their mitigation. Wei et al. (in press) predicted changes of permafrost during next 50 years both in Northeastern China and along the pipeline route, but it was not included in this special issue because of its scopes unt for the journal. 2. Assessment and prediction of permafrost conditions for engineering geology About 500 boreholes, with depths of 5 to 20 m, were drilled and cored for analyses along the CRCOP (only the permafrost portion) in 20072008, and the frozen-ground conditions were evaluated. On the basis of comprehensive analysis of available data, an equivalent latitude Fig. 1. Alternatives and the nalized route for the CRCOP and the SiberiaPacic Crude Oil Pipeline System. 210 H. Jin / Cold Regions Science and Technology 64 (2010) 209212 model (ELM) for mean annual ground surface temperatures (MAGST) was established. Using the nite element method and assuming a climate warming rate of 0.048 C/a, the ELM was combined with the unsteady-state heat conduction model to simulate permafrost tem- peratures at present, and to predict those during the next 50 years (PetroChina Daqing Oileld Engineering Co., Ltd., 2008a, 2008b; Wei, 2008; Jin et al., 2010; Wei et al., 2010). The ELM model was further improved by taking into account of the inuences of topography, snow cover and vegetation on the MAGSTs, and by incorporating the design and construction modes of the CRCOP and on the basis of observational data, and the numerical simulations using the SHAW model. The per- mafrost conditions for engineering geology were carefully analyzed, zoned, and evaluated on the basis of present conditions and predicted changes, particularly the sections for the pipeline crossings under rivers beyond the depths of anticipated scours and over the existing engineered infrastructures, and those may experience signicant (differential) frost hazards and freezethaw cycles. Then, general and specic design principles and mitigative measures were proposed and evaluated using the research results and previous experiences and lessons learned from Alyeska, Norman Wells, and Russia pipelines. The zonation, assessment principles and criteria have been applied in the pipeline design. They have also been used as the scientic bases for the construction, environmental management, operationandmaintenance/ contingency plans (Yang et al., 2010). 3. Pipelinesoil interactions and formation mechanisms of frost hazards In these research projects, the pipesoil interactions in thermal and mechanical/stress processes, and formation mechanisms for the frost heaving and thaw settlement under alternating oil temperature at a range of 6 to +10 C were studied using the numerical models on the thermal and mechanical analyses (Li et al., 2010a, 2010b; Wu et al., 2010; Wen et al., 2010; Zhang et al., 2010) and 1:8 scale laboratory tests (Xu et al., 2010). In the thermal analysis, the research investigated the distribution of oil ows along the pipeline route and during the next 50 years of operation, and its controlling or inuencing factors (Li et al., 2010a), and the developing processes and trends of the frozen and thawed cylinders around the pipeline along the pipeline and during the next 50 years (Li et al., 2010b). The depths of freezethaw processes were studied and predicted for pipeline foundation soils of various combinations of ice/moisture contents and genetic types during the next 50 years (Zhang et al., 2010). In the stress/strain analysis, the effective stress on the pipe surface and its changes due to the (differential) frost heaving and thaw settlement of soils surrounding the pipeline under various insulation congurations, oil pressures, pipe wall thicknesses, and lengths of transition zones between the permafrost and taliks/ seasonally frozen ground, and the allowable and yield strains for the pipeline under (differential) deformations were studied in detail, and the proper mitigative measures, such as pipe insulation, relling with non-frost-susceptible soils, and increase in the pipe wall thickness, were proposed and adopted (Wen et al., 2010; Wu et al., 2010). 4. Frost hazards mitigation and monitoringevaluation system for the CRCOP The research on the long-term stability of pipeline foundation soils was conducted, in which the applied engineering measures were proposed and tested to mitigate the frost hazards and to solve other more general geotechnical problems in cold regions, such as drainage and erosion controls, application of geotextiles, slope stabilization techniques, and re-vegetation methods for the damaged sites due to the pipeline construction, as well as contingency plans for emergency response to oil spills (PetroChina Daqing Oileld Engineering Co., Ltd., 2008b; Yang et al., 2010). A pre-thawing approach and design principle was proposed and adopted in the marginal permafrost regions along the pipeline route, in order to proactively mitigate the frost heave and thaw settlement of pipeline foundation soils in gradual but signicant heat exchange with ambient environments and under a warming climate (Jin et al., 2010). However, in the northern part of the pipeline route, permafrost is more ice-rich and colder (b1 C and down to 3 C), an approach and principle for controlling the thawing process of permafrost was proposed and adopted to ensure the pipeline safety. These work resulted in a conventional burial construction mode for the pipeline modied to adapt to the terrain, drainage and soil conditions. It satisfactorily solved the design issues on the slope stability and crossings of more ice-rich permafrost zones. These studies also provided guidance for the design of the long-term monitoring, evaluation and warning systems for the dynamic changes in thermal and moisture regimes and strain/stress in the pipeline foundation soils in the permafrost regions. 5. Hindsight and prospects In order to solve the permafrost issues challenging the design and construction of the CRCOP, scientists and engineers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and PetroChina formed research teams, and spent about 5 years to reach technically and economically viable and environmentally friendly solutions. In these processes, many prudent scientists and practical engineers from USA, Canada and Russia were consulted on many regards. For example, Professor Max C Brewer from USA, Professor Stuart A. Harris and Dr. Jim Oswell from Canada, and Professor Valetin Kondratiev from Russia have contributed insightfully to the survey, design and construction of the CRCOP. In the meantime, many researchers, such as Lachenbruch (1970), Williams (1986), and Smith and Riseborough (2010), have contrib- uted indirectly to the pipeline design and construction as the English- published results on related research are still in shortage, particularly fromRussia, where the pipeline design, construction, and operation in the vast permafrost regions have been a long history and many successful stories were told. Although this special issue on the CRCOP presents background research and anticipated behavior, it may provide some insights to future pipeline projects or related research. The results of the geocryological studies on the CRCOP have been incorporated in the survey, design and construction at all stages, which signicantly contributed to the construction project and its long-term stability and safety, as well as its environmental friendli- ness. At the same time, the related permafrost study also has signicantly advanced permafrost research in Northeastern China, where the similar research has been relatively quiet for almost 20 years in comparison with those on the QinghaiTibet Plateau. More projects related to highways, railways and airports, as well as for natural resources development and environmental management and protection have been proposed and are now in progress. They would yield more and better understanding of permafrost and cold region environments and engineering in the boreal forest and wetland zones. Since the Last Glaciation Maximum (ca. 32 to 12 ka BP), the permafrost and periglacial environments in Northeastern and Northern China have experienced major changes, with dramatic effects on natural and human environments (Jin et al., 2007; Yang and Jin, in press). In particular, the large-scale exploitation of natural resources and remarkable climate warming since the 1850s and 1950s, have resulted in signicant changes in land use, rapid urbanization and transportation networks, and consequently perma- frost and cold region ecological environments have been profoundly and extensively affected by anthropogenic activities. Up to date, residents in the permafrost regions in Northeastern China have reached 2 million people. Many new towns and forest farms mushroomed as a result of resources development during the last 60 years; highways, railways and airports have been linked into 211 H. Jin / Cold Regions Science and Technology 64 (2010) 209212 networks and have provided easier access to these traditionally considered as remote regions in China. More oil and gas lines are already planned, in design or under construction in addition to many mega projects such as the upstream development of water conser- vancy projects and irrigation systems along major rivers, and increased mining in mineral resources. Therefore, the intensity and speed of socio-economical develop- ment in the permafrost regions in Northeastern China far exceeds those on the QinghaiTibet Plateau and in other Central and High Asian regions, and those in the arctic and subarctic regions, and they are indeed the most profoundly affected in the world. These will inevitably result in rapid and extensive degradation of Xing'anBaikal permafrost under a combined impact from anthropogenic activities and climatic changes because the permafrost is dependent on the local and microenvironments and sensitive to external environmental changes. For example, the areal extent of permafrost in Northeastern China has been reduced from 390,000 km 2 in the 1970s to about 290,000 km 2 by 2000 (Jin et al., 2007). This dramatic change has resulted in noted environmental changes and sent shock waves in forest production and ecological environments in the boreal forests and its impacts on regional sustainable development have been felt. In order to adapt to the rapidly changing natural and engineering environments, the evolution, development, and future trends of permafrost and cold regions environments, the interactions of engineering infrastructures and frozen ground, as well as the impacts of human activities on the permafrost, need to be monitored and studied in greater detail. In addition, on the basis of the establishing long-term monitoring networks on the permafrost ecology and foundation soils in cold regions, including those on the thermal, moisture and stress/strain dynamics of the pipelinesoils systems, as well as the pipeline operating states and structural integrity, the geocryological studies in Northeastern China will be further deepened in many aspects. Acknowledgements Editor-in-Chief Garry Timco, and many editorial staff have provided generous support, and many insightful comments on and advice for revising these papers, which have greatly improved the quality of the 9 papers included in this special issue on the permafrost pipeline. Many unidentied reviewers spent a lot of time in improving the manuscripts and provided timely and cherished opinions on revising these papers. In particular, Professor Emeritus Max C. Brewer with the U.S. Geological Survey in Anchorage, Alaska, and Senior Geotechnical Engineer retired from the Institute of Geotechnical Sciences of the University of Stuttgart, Germany, provided generous, and sometimes meticulous, support in English editing of most of those papers. The guest editor is very much indebted to Professor Brewer, for his strict education on arctic environment and engineering. During my 5-year studies in the University of Alaska Fairbanks and Anchorage, many of my advisors, including Professors Robert F. Carlson, John P. Zarling, and Vladimir E. Romanovsky, exemplied the quality and experiences of professional engineers and educators, and I greatly cherish my experiences in Alaska. The research on the pipelines in permafrost regions and the CRCOP projects were supported by: 1) One Hundred Talented People Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Research on the foundation soils of linear infrastructures in warm permafrost regions under a warming climate; 2) Key Directional Innovation Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Formation mechanisms of frost heave and thaw settlement hazards along the proposed ChinaRussia Crude Oil Pipeline and their mitigative techniques (Grant No. KZCX2- YW-311), and; 3) PetroChina Technical R&D Projects Assessment and prediction of frozen ground conditions for engineering geology along the proposed ChinaRussia Crude Oil Pipeline route and Thermal and stress/strain analyses on and numerical simulations of the foundation soils in a buried pipeline in permafrost regions. References He, R.X., Jin, H.J., 2010. 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