International Journal of Structural Stability and Dynamics

Vol. 17, No. 7 (2017) 1750069 (16 pages)

#.c World Scienti¯c Publishing Company
DOI: 10.1142/S0219455417500699

Strength Assessment of Corroded Pipelines — Finite

Element Simulations and Parametric Studies

Chanyalew Taye Belachew, Mokhtar Che Ismail

and Saravanan Karuppanan*
Mechanical Engineering Department, Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS
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32610 Bandar Seri Iskandar, Perak, Malaysia

*saravanan_karuppanan@petronas.com.my

Received 5 November 2015

Accepted 19 July 2016
Published 12 August 2016

Pipelines are one of the most e±cient means for transporting hydrocarbons from one point to the
other. However, there is a great risk of pipelines operation failure due to the detrimental e®ects of
corrosion. At the point of corrosion, the pipe wall becomes thinner and loses its mechanical resis-
tance. In such cases, reliable defect assessment methods are necessary to decide whether to resume
continual operation or to shut down for maintenance or replacement. However, the available as-
sessment methods are over-conservative, which enforce either unnecessary maintenance or pre-
mature replacement. Furthermore, the defect assessment methods should not only ensure safe
operation, but also optimized operation cost. Therefore, a new assessment method was developed
based on the nonlinear ¯nite element (FE) analysis and a parametric study of geometric parameters
related to the corrosion defect. The new method was validated with burst test database, which can
predict the burst pressure of corroded pipelines with better accuracy and consistency.

Keywords: Corrosion assessment; nonlinear analysis; parametric study; pipeline; ¯nite element
analysis.

Nomenclature

d : depth of corrosion defect

D : nominal outside diameter of the pipe
L : axial extent of the defect
SMTS : speci¯ed minimum tensile strength
t : nominal wall thickness of the pipe
w : circumferential width of metal loss defect

* Corresponding author.

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 C. T. Belachew, M. C. Ismail & S. Karuppanan

Pb : burst pressure of corroded pipe

Pint : internal pressure
Po : burst pressure of intact pipe

e : von Mises stress (e®ective stress)

UTS : ultimate tensile stress
"e : von Mises strain (e®ective strain)

1. Introduction
Pipelines experience metal loss from their walls due to corrosion. Corrosion is a time
dependent electrochemical process that depends on the local environment within or
adjacent to the pipeline.1 Therefore, operating corroded pipelines is an expensive and
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risky task because of potential catastrophic failure.2 Mostly pipelines operate in

remote areas and failures rarely cause fatalities to the public, but they can disrupt an
operator's business, either by loss of supply or by necessary remedial work. To
recover the pipelines operation from a failure is extremely costly in terms of re-
placement and repair. The economic consequences of a reduced operating pressure,
loss of production due to downtime, repairs or replacement can be severe and, in
some cases not a®ordable.3 Therefore, a reliable defect assessment method is required
to ensure safe operation.
Currently, there are several methods for assessing corrosion metal loss defects.
Most of these methods, such as ASME B31.G,4 Modi¯ed B31G,5 RSTRENG6 and
DNV RP-F101,7 were developed based on the original NG-18 equation and
ANSI/ASME B31G code. Although these criteria can simplify the integrity assess-
ment of in-service pipelines, they are known to be over-conservative and thus enforce
premature retirement of pipelines.8 However, pipeline operators need a reliable defect
assessment method not only to ensure the safe operation of pipelines, but also to
optimize the operation cost. Accordingly, various alternative assessment methods
have been studied recently based mainly on the burst tests and ¯nite element (FE)
studies.
In this paper, an attempt has been made to establish a new assessment method for
a single layered steel pipe based on the nonlinear FE simulations and a parametric
study of the geometric parameters related to the corrosion defect. The new method
has been validated with the burst test database to con¯rm its accuracy and
consistency.

2. Nonlinear FE Analysis
Modern numerical methods have enabled the modeling of realistic defect shapes and
nonlinear material behavior.9 Conventional procedures used to assess the integrity of
corroded piping systems with axial defects generally employed simpli¯ed failure
criteria based on a plastic collapse failure mechanism incorporating the tensile

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 Strength Assessment of Corroded Pipelines

properties of the pipe material.10 In this paper, a new defect assessment method
based on parametric study of nonlinear FE simulation results is presented. Stress-
based criterion using plastic instability analysis was used to predict the
failure pressure during FE analyses.11 The nonlinear stress–strain relationship and
the changes in geometry due to large displacements were employed during the
simulations.
A nonlinear elastic–plastic stress criterion typically provides a better prediction of
safe load carrying capacity for a component. Traditional linear elastic stress analyses
and the allowable stress criteria provide only a rough estimate of failure loads,
because they ignore nonlinear phenomenon that occurs in components at failure.
Nonlinear elastic–plastic analysis accounts for the nonlinearities due to material,
large deformation or combination of the two in the analyses of plastic collapse load.
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Plastic collapse loads are de¯ned as the maximum load where the material response is
elastic–plastic which includes the strain hardening and large displacement e®ects.
Closed form solutions for plastic collapse loads are not readily available, so numerical
techniques such as FE analyses may be used to obtain a solution. The calculated
stress intensity for limit or plastic collapse loads can be compared to allowable stress
intensities to determine the structural integrity of the component.

2.1. Geometrical nonlinearities

Small de°ection and small strain analyses assume that the displacements are small
enough so that the resulting sti®ness changes are insigni¯cant. In contrast, large
strain analyses account for the sti®ness changes that result from the changes in
elements' shape and orientation. Large deformations are associated with the neces-
sity to update the coordinates of the node locations. Therefore, during the simula-
tion, large strain e®ects were activated. The large strain procedure places no
theoretical limit on the total rotation or strain experienced by an element. Certain
ANSYS r element types will be subjected to practical limitation on total strain.12
However, the procedure requires restricted strain increments to maintain the accu-
racy. Thus, the total load should be divided into smaller steps and to be applied
incrementally step-by-step up to the failure point.

2.2. Material nonlinearities

Material nonlinearities arise from the presence of time-independent behavior, like
plasticity in this case. To predict the behavior of a corrosion defect, the material
behavior, in particular the plastic behavior must be modeled accurately. The FE
model allows the material behavior to be modeled with an uniaxial true stress–strain
curve. The use of true-stress versus true-strain data allows an incremental plasticity
scheme to be used which can account for strain hardening and subsequent unloading,
but it requires a signi¯cant increase in computing time.13 In this study, multilinear
kinematic hardening material model was used.12

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Fig. 1. Tensile properties of API X52 grade steel pipe material.

The material employed in this study was API X52 grade steel. The mean yield
strength, mean ultimate tensile strength and mean ultimate tensile strain are
377.7 MPa, 513.4 MPa and 9.1%, respectively. The mean tensile strain at failure is
16.5%. The stress versus strain diagram is shown in Fig. 1.

2.3. Finite element modeling

Depending on the di®erent forms of corrosion defects, axisymmetric idealization,
plane strain idealization or 3D approaches can be used to analyze the FE models. In a
structural problem, if one of the dimensions is signi¯cantly longer than the other
dimensions de¯ning a uniform cross-sectional area, and if the structure is subjected
to only uniform lateral loads, then plane strain idealization is valid. Longitudinally
extended groove like defects shown in Fig. 2(a) can be idealized by plane strain
models.14 Practically, such defects can occur on the pipeline due to accumulation of
water at the bottom surface, due to sand erosion or due to °uid level mark of
strati¯ed °ow of the pipeline. Circumferentially extended defects in pipelines as
shown in Fig. 2(b) can be idealized by an axisymmetric model. Practically, such
defects can be present on the pipeline due to cases like girth weld defects. For these
two models PLANE182 elements can be used for the analyses.
However, for an accurate application of the FE method, corrosion geometries shall
be modeled by using large number of 3D solid elements and large displacement
elastic–plastic analysis shall be used to model the material response. A patch like
corrosion defects can be represented by a 3D model as shown in Fig. 3(a). Taking
symmetry into consideration, only one quarter of the pipe section was modeled for
FE analysis as shown in Fig. 3(b). At least two layers of elements were used through
the remaining ligament of each corrosion defect. A higher-order 8-node solid element

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 Strength Assessment of Corroded Pipelines

(a) (b)
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Fig. 2. Types of defects (a) longitudinal slot and (b) circumferential groove.

All degrees of
freedom fixed

defect

Symmetric Pressure
Boundary application
Conditions

(a) (b)

Fig. 3. FE model of °at-bottomed rectangular corrosion defect (a) idealized °at-bottomed

rectangular defect and (b) quarter model, mesh close view at the defect and the boundary conditions
applied.

(SOLID 185) was used for the analyses. The models were meshed by considering the
divisions of elements, aspect ratio and size of the elements. A re¯ned mesh was
considered at the defect region, as in Fig. 3(b). A convergence study was also con-
ducted to ensure the accuracy of the results obtained and to optimize the number of
mesh used. Symmetry boundary conditions were used at the cut sections and addi-
tional restraints were also applied to the models to eliminate rigid body motion. The
model was extended far enough from the region of the defect, in this case half-length
of 1 m, to avoid the end e®ects on the analysis. Internal pressure load was applied to
the inner wall and automatically increased up to the failure point. The end caps
of the pipe were simulated by constraining all degrees of freedom at the other end of
the pipe.

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 C. T. Belachew, M. C. Ismail & S. Karuppanan

3. Failure Analyses
Failure may be de¯ned as a limit above which the material fails. It may occur as a
fracture, excessive deformation or when an arbitrary set value of stress, strain or
energy is reached. Corrosion defects are relatively smooth and pipe materials are
generally tough. Therefore, the failure of the corrosion defect is usually by plastic
collapse of the defected ligament as opposed to low ductile fracture.13 Observations
of the corroded material in the vicinity of the failures showed a signi¯cant amount of
plastic deformation and localized necking indicating that the initial failure occurred
by plastic collapse.15
FE analysis of the corroded pipe by itself does not predict the failure pressure of
the pipeline. This is because the FE model used to date does not predict
local instabilities, such as necking, which are usually factors for ultimate failure.
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Thus, there should be a de¯ned criterion to decide the failure point during simula-
tion. Most commonly, the strain-based criterion and two criterion approaches
(stress-based or instability-based) have been used to assess the plastic collapse of a
corrosion defect using the FE method. The stress-based or instability-based criterion
was used in this work. These approaches involve the determination of a critical stress
or strain value from stress–strain relationship of the material.13 The critical stress is
de¯ned as the ultimate tensile strength on the true stress–strain curve. Plastic col-
lapse was predicted to occur when the equivalent stress exceeded the critical stress
through the entire thickness of the ligament.
The variation of local von Mises stress through the corrosion ligament shown in
Fig. 4(a) was studied. When the internal pressure was increased, the von Mises stress
exhibits three distinct stages before the occurrence of numerical instability. As shown
in Fig. 4(b), these were identi¯ed as the elastic deformation, the plastic deformation
and the material hardening stage.

. The elastic deformation stage: A linear response progressing throughout the

ligament until the plastic limit was reached.
. The plastic deformation stage: After the stress state at the corrosion bottom
surface exceeded the materials yield strength, the plasticity spread through the

External
Node

Mid
Internal
Node
Node

(a)

Fig. 4. Mechanism of failure: (a) corrosion defect, (b) von Mises stress distribution through the ligament.

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 Strength Assessment of Corroded Pipelines

600 von Mises Stress = Critical Stress

500
von Mises Stress, MPa

Elastic Deformation
400

Strain Hardening
300

Pint = Pb
200
Plastic
Deformation
Internal Node
100 Mid Node
External Node
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0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
Internal Pressure, MPa

(b)

Fig. 4. (Continued )

remaining ligament until the plasticity reached the opposite wall surface. The von
Mises equivalent stress increases slowly because of the constraint of the sur-
rounding pipe wall. During the burst test, this phenomenon was manifested as
permanent deformation in the form of bulging at the defect.
. The material hardening stage: The whole of the ligament deformed plastically but
failure does not occur because of material work hardening. Finally failure occurred
when the minimum von Mises equivalent stress in the ligament was equal to the
true ultimate tensile strength of the material. At this stage, as shown in Fig. 5, the
plastic strain increased drastically which con¯rmed the structural instability.

14

12
Effective Strain, %

10
Internal Node
8 Mid Node
External Node
6

0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
Pint , MPa

Fig. 5. von Mises plastic strain distribution through the ligament.

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 C. T. Belachew, M. C. Ismail & S. Karuppanan

4. Results and Discussion

4.1. Finite element simulations
The simulation results were used to study the e®ects of the geometric parameters of
the defects on the burst pressure of the pipeline. The ranges of geometric parameters
analyzed are shown in Table 1, where the parameters marked in bold face were
adopted as the base case. For example, in one series of analyses, D, t, d/t and w=t
were assigned to the bold values while changing L=D from 0.25 to 2.0. Similarly for
another series, D, t, L/D and w=t were kept constant, and d=t was varied from 0.1 to
0.9. For the full matrix of the pipe and defect dimensions given above, a total of 504
FE models were analyzed. Prior to that, the FE model developed and the analysis
technique employed were validated with the results of burst test carried out by
Belachew et al.16 The di®erences of less than 5% have been observed between the FE
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simulation and burst test results which validated the FE technique employed in this
paper. For convenience, all predicted values were normalized by the failure pressure
of a defect free pipe. This ratio shown below describes the remaining strength factor
(RSF) of the defected pipe:
Pb 2t
RSF ¼ ; where Po ¼ SMTS : ð1Þ
Po D
t
The RSF prediction versus normalized defect depth for longitudinal defect is shown
in Fig. 6. The RSF values are almost equal for all values of the corrosion defect for
w=t  2 and are inversely proportional to the defect depth. For example, the RSF
value for w=t ¼ 15 at d=t ¼ 0:6 is only less by 0.45% from the RSF values for w=t ¼ 5
at d=t ¼ 0:6. For narrow defects like in the case of w=t  1, stress concentrations are
developed at the corrosion bottom surface, therefore, the plasticity spreading stage
and the post yielding hardening stage were mixed. In such cases, when the highest
von Mises stress value at the bottom of the defect exceeds the true stress level, the
remaining part of the defect still deforms elastically. Such stress level may cause
cracking. Therefore, failure criterion for narrower defects may be established based
on fracture mechanics study.
Additional results on the analyses of shallow (d=t ¼ 0:3), intermediate (d=t ¼ 0:5)
and deep (d=t ¼ 0:7) longitudinal defects versus w=t are shown in Fig. 7. As the
corrosion width increased from w=t ¼ 2 to w=t ¼ 15, the gradient of the through
thickness stress distribution at the corrosion center become approximately uniform

Table 1. Material and geometric parameters analyzed.

Material API X52

D (mm) 274.0
t (mm) 12.0
d=t 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5, 0.6, 0.7, 0.8, 0.9
L=D 0.25, 0.5, 0.75, 1.0, 1.25, 1.5, 1.75, 2.0
w=t 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 15

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 Strength Assessment of Corroded Pipelines

1.00

0.80

0.60 w= t
RSF

w = 2t
w = 3t
0.40
w = 5t
w = 15t
0.20

0.00
0.00 0.10 0.20 0.30 0.40 0.50 0.60 0.70 0.80 0.90 1.00
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Normalized Defect Depth (d/t)

Fig. 6. RSF versus defect depth for longitudinal defects.

1.00
d/t = 0.3
d/t = 0.5
d/t = 0.7
0.80
RSF

0.60

0.40

0.20
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Normalized Defect Width (w/t)

Fig. 7. RSF versus defect width for longitudinal defects.

and the stage of plasticity spreading is reduced. Therefore, the increase of corrosion
width beyond w=t ¼ 2 has insigni¯cant e®ect on the RSF.
Figures 8 and 9 show the RSF values for circumferential and °at-bottomed
defects, respectively. For longer corrosion defects (L=D > 1:0), approximately linear
RSF distributions were obtained for both models. This type of stress distribution
indicated that the local stress states are controlled by membrane stress and bending
moment, instead of stress concentration. Therefore, both the membrane stress and
the bending stress in the hoop direction increase. The nonlinear stress analyses show
that such stress states result in a localized bulging deformation. This implies that
failure would occur in the manner of plastic collapse as the pressure load exceeded a

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 C. T. Belachew, M. C. Ismail & S. Karuppanan

1.00

0.80

0.60
RSF

L/D = 0.05

0.40 L/D = 0.15

L/D = 0.20
L/D = 0.65
0.20 L/D = 1.00
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0.00
0.00 0.10 0.20 0.30 0.40 0.50 0.60 0.70 0.80 0.90 1.00
Normalized Defect Depth (d/t)

Fig. 8. RSF versus defect depth for circumferential defects.

1.00

0.80

0.60
RSF

L/D = 0.75
0.40
L/D = 1.50
RSF = -0.91(d/t) + 1.03
Linearized (L/D =1.50)
R² = 0.99
0.20

0.00
0.00 0.20 0.40 0.60 0.80 1.00
Normalized Defect Depth (d/t)

Fig. 9. RSF versus defect depth for °at-bottomed rectangular defects.

critical level. For shorter corrosion defects (L=D  1:0), the RSF is not linear with
d=t values because of the stress concentration due to the smaller localized defects.
Therefore, the e®ects of shorter defects were incorporated by an exponential factor
when the new defect assessment was developed.
The RSF values versus the defect length for circumferential and °at-bottomed
defects are shown in Figs. 10 and 11, respectively. When the corrosion length de-
creased, the RSF values for any size of defects increased and approached the value
of a defect free pipe. By keeping d=t constant, when corrosion length is increased,
the rate of RSF reduction became smaller. This indicated that RSF values remained

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 Strength Assessment of Corroded Pipelines

1.10

d/t = 0.3
0.90 d/t = 0.5
d/t = 0.7

0.70
RSF

0.50

0.30
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0.10
0.00 0.40 0.80 1.20 1.60
Normalized Defect length (L/D)

Fig. 10. RSF versus defect length for circumferential defects.

1.00
d/t = 0.30
d/t = 0.50
d/t = 0.70
0.80
RSF

0.60

0.40

0.20
0.00 0.50 1.00 1.50 2.00
Normalized Defect Length (L/D)

Fig. 11. RSF versus defect length for °at-bottomed rectangular defects.

constant when the corrosion length exceeded a certain value (L=D  2). Once again
we can see that the depth of the defect has the strongest detrimental e®ect on the
RSF values, but with varied severity depending on the d=t range. For d=t < 0:1,
the loss in the burst capacity is fairly small (within 5%). As the defect grows deeper,
this e®ect gets much more pronounced.

4.2. Parametric study

The new corrosion assessment code was developed based on the dimensional
analysis of variables describing the defect. Dimensional analysis provides a means of

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 C. T. Belachew, M. C. Ismail & S. Karuppanan

consolidating experimental, analytical, and computational results into a compact

form for obtaining analytical results. The variables which in°uence the failure
pressure for a given defect dimensions are shown as

Pb ¼ fðD; t; d; L; w; Po Þ: ð2Þ
The units for each parameters described in Eq. (2) are Pb  Po  M  L
1  T
2
and D  t  d  L  w  L. Therefore, in this expression, there are seven variables
and three fundamental dimensions. According to Buckingham's
theorem,17 the
number of
terms that can be formed is 4. Hence, using Buckingham's
theorem,
Eq. (2) can be reduced to a relationship between nondimensional variables as
follows:


Pb t L d w
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Po D D D D
which can be rewritten in the form of power series as

 1
 2
 3     n
Pb X 1
t L d w 4
¼ An ; ; ; : ð4Þ
Po n¼0 D D D D

We can simplify Eq. (4) by neglecting higher order terms (n > 1) and setting A0 ¼ 1.
Therefore, the simpli¯ed equation is shown in the following:

 1
 2
 3  
Pb t L d w 4
 1 þ A1 ð5Þ
Po D D D D
which can be further simpli¯ed by considering the following three facts:

. The parametric factor t=D is constant and it is independent of the corrosion defect.
. The defect depth is usually expressed as a percentage loss of the wall thickness,
thus, the parametric factor d=D can be expressed as a linear multiple of d=t.
. Since the parametric study indicated little in°uence of the parameter w=D on Pb
for w=D  2:0, the exponent 4 is assigned to zero.

Therefore, the ¯nal form of the equation is

 m
 n
Pb d L
RSF ¼ ¼1
k : ð6Þ
Po t D
The parameters on the right-hand side of Eq. (6) describe the defect geometry. For
smaller size of the depth or the length, the RSF value approach 1. Therefore, this
factor indicated the lost strength due to the defect and we may call it the lost
strength factor (LSF). The constants k; m and n were determined from the curve
¯tting of the simulation results based on the least-squares error method. Figures 12
and 13 show the FE results versus the LSF for L=D  1 and for 1 < L=D  2, re-
spectively. The best ¯t equations had correlation coe±cients of 0.97 and 0.99, re-
spectively. Therefore, the newly proposed method has the form depicted by Eq. (7).

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 Strength Assessment of Corroded Pipelines

0.80

0.60

1-RSF = 0.79 LSF

R² = 0.97
1 - RSF

0.40

FE Prediction
0.20
Linearized (FE Prediction)

0.00
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0.00 0.20 0.40 0.60 0.80

LSF

Fig. 12. FE results versus the LSF for L=D  1.

If w  2t and 0:2  d=t  0:8:



 0:4 
d L
Pb ¼ Po 1
0:8 for L=D  1:0; ð7aÞ
t D


 0:1 
d L
Pb ¼ Po 1
0:8 for 1:0 < L=D  2:0; ð7bÞ
t D


d
Pb ¼ Po 1
0:85 for L=D  2:0: ð7cÞ
t

Even though the equations above are developed for a single defect, they can also
be used to estimate the burst pressure for multiple defects. The dominant parameters

0.80

0.70
1 - RSF = 0.80 LSF
0.60 R² = 0.99

0.50
1 - RSF

0.40

0.30 FE Prediction
Linearized (FE Prediction)
0.20

0.10
0.10 0.20 0.30 0.40 0.50 0.60 0.70 0.80 0.90
LSF

Fig. 13. FE results versus the LSF for 1 < L=D  2.

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 C. T. Belachew, M. C. Ismail & S. Karuppanan

in the developed equations are the defect depth and length. The width of the defect
has insigni¯cant e®ect on the burst pressure. Therefore, when two or more defects are
very close to each other, the equations above can be used by substituting the
equivalent depth and length of the defect. The procedure to ¯nd the equivalent depth
and length is described in DNV code.7

4.3. Veri¯cation of ¯ndings

The comparison of predicted RSF values by di®erent methods with the FE simula-
tion results is shown in Fig. 14. Since the new method was developed based on the
curve ¯tting of the FE simulations, the ¯tting was with an average error of less than
1.0%, and standard deviation of the error was less than 3%. The predictions were
scattered within only 5% along the 1:1 line. But the comparison of the remaining
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three methods showed conservative estimations and large scatters. The B31G code
provided an overall mean bias of 33% lower estimation with some of the predictions
as low as 56% from the FE predictions. Similarly, the Modi¯ed B31G criteria showed
an average bias of 21% with relatively minimum scatter up to 28%. For the DNV
method, the mean bias was 28% and the minimum prediction was scattered as low
as 43%.
Since the new method was developed based on the API X52 steel, it is necessary to
check the validity of the method to lower or higher grade pipe materials. Therefore,
benchmarking of the new method with burst test database consisting of 100 tests
with di®erent grade of steel was carried out. The comparison of predicted RSF and
actual values from the burst test database is shown in Fig. 15. For a reference

1.00

0.80
RSF Predicted by FE

0.60

0.40
New Method
B31G

0.20 M. B31G
DNV
1:1 Line

0.00
0.00 0.10 0.20 0.30 0.40 0.50 0.60 0.70 0.80 0.90 1.00
RSF Predicted by Different Methods

Fig. 14. Comparison of RSF predictions.

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 Strength Assessment of Corroded Pipelines

1.00

0.80
RSF (Predicted)

0.60

0.40 New Method

M. B31G
1:1 Line
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0.20
0.20 0.30 0.40 0.50 0.60 0.70 0.80 0.90 1.00
RSF (Burst Test Database)

Fig. 15. Comparison between actual and predicted RSF values.

purpose, the prediction by Modi¯ed B31G code was plotted in the same graph. The
comparison showed that the new method has good agreement with the burst test
database. The predictions were evenly distributed with about 7:0% deviation from
the actual with an average error of only about 0.30%. For the Modi¯ed B31G, the
predictions were all conservative with a mean bias of about 21% and scattered with
as low as 28% lower estimation.

5. Conclusions
The new corrosion defect assessment method was developed based on the simulation
results by means of dimensional analyses of variables describing the defect. The new
method was veri¯ed against 100 burst test database recorded in published literatures.
The predictions by the new method agreed with the burst test database within 7:0%
from the actual value. The average error was only about 0.30%. Therefore, the new
method can be used for prediction of the maximum allowable operating pressure of
corroded pipelines, provided that appropriate operations safety factor is considered.

Acknowledgment
The authors would like to thank Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS for providing the
facilities for the research work.

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