Field Deployment of an Innovative Acoustic Monitoring System for Remote Real-time Pipeline Asset Integrity

Real-time monitoring of pipeline integrity is a key factor for the environmental sustainability of oil & gas industry. eni launched in 2009 an R&D project for developing a real-time technology based upon vibroacoustic sensing. In principle any interaction with a pipe filled with gas or liquid generates pressure waves that are guided within the fluid for long distances, carrying information on the source event. Among these events, leaks (due to corrosion, incidents, theft, etc.) are the ones where real-time monitoring has a paramount value. Starting from 2010, acquisition campaigns in controlled scenarios were carried out and a validation of the mathematical models of pressure wave’s propagation in fluid filled pipes was performed. More recently, background noise removal algorithms have been developed to further increase the sensitivity of the system in terms of decreased leak size and false alarm rate. In late 2013 the technology fulfilled the technology innovation qualification system of eni. Since 2007, NAOC (eni’s Nigerian affiliate) has registered a significant increase of oil spill events due to sabotage and oil theft activities. The situation that has arisen posed such risks for the safety of people and for the protection of the environment, that it has been decided to investigate new detection and monitoring systems. In fact, monitoring of the pipelines with other real-time systems which require the presence of sensors all along the pipes (for instance fiber optics technologies) are neither difficult nor economic to implement in the Nigerian existing pipelines. The innovative technology presented here overcomes this weakness, by allowing detecting and locating leaks taking place up to a distance of 35 km from the sensors.