PIPELINE PRECOMMISSIONING & COMMISSIONING

IPEC offers a full range of pre-commissioning and commissioning services and is becoming the service-provider of choice for pipeline construction companies looking for reliability, safety and quality.

The limits of the pipeline pre-commissioning activities are from pig launcher to pig receiver and include all in-line valves, flanges and fittings.

The different sequential pre-commissioning work phases are:

• Filling (Flooding) using forced flooding or free-filling methods.
• Cleaning using chemical or mechanical methods that removes deposits or debris to ensure optimum flow and efficient throughput.
• Gauging that detects any internal restrictions and gives indicative results as to whether the pipeline is geometrically suitable for the progression to more aggressive cleaning pigs. Gauging is achieved by fitting a pig with an aluminum plate, sized to approximately 90% of internal pipeline diameter. This is carried out to prove the dimensional quality of the internal diameter of the pipeline.
• Hydro-testing is performed to expose defective materials that have missed prior detection, ensure that any remaining defects are insignificant enough to allow operation at design pressures, expose possible leaks and serve as a final validation of the integrity of the constructed system.
• Dewatering and Swabbing using advanced compression and dewatering train designs to leave the minimal residual water.
• Drying using forced air to lower the internal dew point of pipeline. This avoids hydrate formation when pipeline is put into service by using the blower. For natural gas and petrochemical pipelines, thorough drying or conditioning is essential to prevent the formation of hydrates and deliver the product purity you need.
  • Air drying: Our air drying units can dry air to dew point of water of −80 °C that helps achieve specified values on pipeline output quickly.
  • Vacuum drying: Evaporation of water intensifies and boiling point of water drops with decreasing atmospheric pressure. High ambient temperature also helps to increase efficiency of vacuum drying.
• Purging using Nitrogen to effectively and completely purge the pipeline prior to commissioning, capping or abandonment. The mobile nitrogen unit is considered for this purpose.
• Commissioning: introducing the product medium to the pipeline which is usually performed by adding a batch of neutral gas (like Nitrogen) in between air and pipeline product and running all by product medium.
• Leak Detection of subsea pipelines by means of injecting sea dye colored water into the pipeline with high pressure pumps so that the leak can be seen in the sea by divers or ROV.
• Pig Rescue of stuck pigs that have been occurred during various operations. The rescue operation will be performed after some engineered decision-making activities that lead to an operational solution.
• Pipeline Repair of damaged or defected sections of the pipeline which are detected according to In-Line Inspection or visual inspections.