Structure and Infrastructure Engineering

Maintenance, Management, Life-Cycle Design and Performance

ISSN: 1573-2479 (Print) 1744-8980 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/nsie20

Statistical analysis of spatial distribution of

external corrosion defects in buried pipelines
using a multivariate Poisson-lognormal model

Xiangrong Wang, Hui Wang, Fujian Tang, Homero Castaneda & Robert Liang

To cite this article: Xiangrong Wang, Hui Wang, Fujian Tang, Homero Castaneda & Robert Liang
(2020): Statistical analysis of spatial distribution of external corrosion defects in buried pipelines
using a multivariate Poisson-lognormal model, Structure and Infrastructure Engineering, DOI:
10.1080/15732479.2020.1766516

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/15732479.2020.1766516

Published online: 20 May 2020.

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STRUCTURE AND INFRASTRUCTURE ENGINEERING
https://doi.org/10.1080/15732479.2020.1766516

Statistical analysis of spatial distribution of external corrosion defects in buried

pipelines using a multivariate Poisson-lognormal model
Xiangrong Wanga , Hui Wanga , Fujian Tangb , Homero Castanedac and Robert Lianga
a
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Engineering Mechanics, The University of Dayton, Dayton, OH, USA; bState Key
Laboratory of Coastal and Offshore Engineering, School of Civil Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, Liaoning, China;
c
Department of Material Science and Engineering, National Corrosion and Materials Reliability Center, Texas A&M University, College
Station, TX, USA

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

It is well recognised that the severity of pipeline external corrosion is highly related to the corrosivity Received 20 November 2019
of the surrounding soil environment. However, in practice, the explicit effects of the soil corrosivity Revised 29 January 2020
variables on the spatial distribution of external corrosion defects are largely unknown. This paper Accepted 25 February 2020
presents a novel modelling and predicting approach for pipeline external corrosion defect count data
KEYWORDS
in terms of spatial patterns using on a multivariate Poisson-lognormal (MVPLN) model. The MVPLN External corrosion;
model can account for the over-dispersion and unobserved heterogeneity of the defect count data, as maintenance & inspection;
well as consider the stochastic correlation between corrosion defects with different spatial patterns. multivariate Poisson-
The developed model is applied to a pipeline inspection dataset consisting in-line inspection (ILI) data lognormal model; pipeline;
and corresponding soil corrosivity measurements. Its performance is validated by using cross-valid- probability density
ation. A comparison study shows that the MVPLN model provides superior modelling results for the functions; soil corrosivity;
spatial distribution of external corrosion defects over the commonly used univariate count data mod- spatial patterns;
els. In addition, the obtained model coefficients of the soil corrosivity measurements are discussed, stochastic models
and their estimated impacts on the spatial patterns of corrosion defects are verified qualitatively. The
potential application to assess the corrosion severity of non-piggable pipeline segments is further
demonstrated.
Abbreviations: CI: confidence interval; Cl
: chloride ion; CO2

3 : carbonate ion; DIC: deviance informa-
tion criteria; exGPD: exponentiated generalised Pareto distribution; FeCO3 : iron carbonate; HCO

3 : bicar-
bonate ion; ILI: in-line inspection; K–S test: Kolmogorov–Smirnov test; M-H algorithm:
Metropolis–Hastings algorithm; MCMC: Markov chain Monte Carlo; MIC: microbiologically influenced
corrosion; MLE: maximum-likelihood estimate; MVNB model: multivariate negative binomial model;
MVP model: multivariate Poisson model; MVPLN model: multivariate Poisson-lognormal model; NB dis-
tribution/model: negative binomial distribution/model; PLN model: Poisson-lognormal model; PMF:
probability mass function; RMSE: root-mean-square error; SO2
4 : sulphate ion; SRB: sulphate-reducing
bacteria; UVNB model: univariate negative binomial model; UVPLN model: univariate Poisson-lognor-
mal model

1. Introduction and propagation of external corrosion defects typically

Pipeline system is a critical part of the infrastructure sys-
tems that ensure the safety and functionality of our society
as it provides one of the most reliable ways for transporting
large quantities of liquid and gas products over long distan-
ces. However, the aging and degrading of pipeline coatings
and cathodic protection systems weaken the protection of
pipeline metals from the aggressive and corrosive surround-
ing soil environment and ultimately result in metal-loss
corrosion, which severely threatens the integrity and oper-
ational safety of underground pipelines. External localised
corrosion (a.k.a. pitting corrosion) is known as one of the
most common corrosion defects for pipelines under normal
operation conditions (Caleyo, Alfonso, Alc
antara, & Hallen,
2008; Kishawy & Gabbar, 2010). In practice, the nucleation
involve multiple factors, complex processes and various
uncertainties, which make it extremely difficult to explain
and predict such phenomena using explicit electrochemical
principles alone. As a result, statistical approaches are widely
employed for modelling and evaluating the severity of exter-
nal corrosion spots on underground pipelines, as well as
quantifying the related uncertainties (El-Abbasy, Senouci,
Zayed, Mirahadi, & Parvizsedghy, 2014; Katano, Miyata,
Shimizu, & Isogai, 2003; Melchers, 2005; Shibata, 1996;
Sinha & Pandey, 2002; Vel
azquez, Caleyo, Valor, & Hallen,
2009; Wang, Yajima, Liang, & Castaneda, 2015a, 2015b).
Analysis of external corrosion defects and their impacts
on the integrity of a pipeline can be conducted from either
or both of the spatial and temporal dimensions, which could
be correlated with each other: 1) temporal analysis focusing

CONTACT Hui Wang hwang12@udayton.edu Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Engineering Mechanics, The University of Dayton,
Dayton, OH, 45469 USA
ß 2020 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
2 X. WANG ET AL.
on the depth or the growth rate of the corrosion defects; 2)
spatial analysis investigating the spatial distribution and
density of the corrosion defects along the pipeline right-of-
way. The former has attracted most concern; substantial
corrosion growth models have been developed in existing
studies (Baz
an & Beck, 2013; Caleyo, Vel
azquez, Valor, &
Hallen, 2009a, 2009b; Valor, Caleyo, Hallen, & Vel
azquez,
2013; Wang, Yajima, Liang, & Castaneda, 2016). Although
the latter has gained relative less attention, investigation on
the spatial distribution of the corrosion defects is crucial for
conducting pipeline safety assessment and optimising pipe-
line inspection and maintenance strategies.
It has been demonstrated in both experimental and theoret-
ical studies that interaction among nearby corrosion defects
may result in complicated and threatening failure modes of
the pipeline wall (Benjamin, Freire, Vieira, & Cunha, 2016;
Benjamin, Freire, Vieira, & de Andrade, 2008; Chen et al.,
2015; De Andrade et al., 2008; Li, Bai, Su, & Li, 2016). While
from a broader view of the system integrity, it has been
reported that the spatial distribution of corrosion defects can
exert critical impacts on the system failure probability (Hong,
1999; Kishawy & Gabbar, 2010; Zhou, Hong, & Zhang, 2012).
Therefore, this study is aiming at developing a novel approach
for modelling the spatial distribution of the corrosion defects,
the application of which, combined with existing temporal
analysis approaches, is expected to deliver a more accurate
assessment of the pipeline system safety and integrity.
In the literature, corrosion defect count data of a pipeline
section are commonly modelled using homogenous Poisson
processes (Alamilla, Oliveros, & Garc
ıa-Vargas, 2009;
Alamilla & Sosa, 2008). This implies that a corrosion defect
can randomly and independently occur at any location
along the pipeline with a constant probability (Alamilla,
Espinosa-Medina, & Sosa, 2009; Caleyo, Gonz
alez, & Hallen,
2002). Such a strong assumption has two major contradic-
tions with observations in practice. Firstly, it has been
widely recognised that the nucleation and propagation of
adjacent corrosion defects can be a highly interactive pro-
cess rather than completely independent random events
(Benjamin, Freire, & Vieira, 2007; Cosham, Hopkins, &
Macdonald, 2007; Silva, Guerreiro, & Loula, 2007). Secondly,
the soil corrosivity and other corrosion-related factors may
vary significantly along the alignment of a pipeline, thereby
exerting various impacts on the corrosion severity. Therefore,
it seems to be oversimplified to neglect the spatial variability
of these factors and to postulate the distribution of corrosion
defects as a stationary random field.
Substantial efforts have been made to address the draw-
back of the homogenous Poisson assumption (De La Cruz,
Kuniewski, Van Noortwijk, & Guti
errez, 2008; Valor et al.,
2015). Taking into account of corrosion mechanism, Valor
et al. (2015) developed a spatial distribution model of exter-
nal corrosion defects using the negative binomial (NB) dis-
tribution. It was claimed that the NB distribution could
account for corrosion defects with different spatial patterns
and provide reasonable fitting results for real-life defect
count data. Inspired by this and relevant findings, this study
investigates not only the statistical model of the spatial
distribution of the corrosion defects, but also the inter-
dependency between the soil corrosivity measures and the
spatial density of the corrosion defects. Understanding of
such interdependency can reveal complex natures of the
corrosion mechanism, thereby guiding the development of
countermeasures for corrosion-lead pipeline failures.
Moreover, it will be demonstrated that this investigation
may provide a feasible way to estimate the corrosion sever-
ity of the non-piggable pipeline segments.
This study presents a statistical analysis of the spatial distri-
bution of external corrosion defect count data on a buried
pipeline based on the multivariate Poisson-lognormal
(MVPLN) model. Under the framework of the MVPLN
model, counts of both random corrosion defects and clustered
defects (Shibata, 2000) of a pipeline segment are considered as
correlated dependent variables and modelled jointly. The phys-
ical and chemical characteristics of the surrounding soil envir-
onment, which have been proven highly related to the density
and distribution of external corrosion defects (Alamilla,
Espinosa-Medina, et al., 2009; Ferreira, Ponciano, Vaitsman, &
P
erez, 2007; Frankel, 1998; Punckt et al., 2004), are considered
as the explanatory variables. Other unobservable factors are
considered as latent effects in the model.
A data set consisting in-line inspection (ILI) data and
soil corrosivity measurements along a 110-km-long buried
oil transportation pipeline (Wang et al., 2015b) is used to
demonstrate the performance of the presented statistical
model. The paper starts with the statistical characteristics of
external corrosion defect count data, followed by the
MVPLN model and parameter estimation using Markov
chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) technique. Then, the proposed
approach is illustrated and validated using a real-life pipeline
external corrosion data-set. Finally, the validity, effectiveness,
additional insights and potential application in modelling spa-
tial frequency of external corrosion defects for non-piggable
pipeline segments are further discussed.
2. Model framework and estimation
2.1. Statistical characteristics of external corrosion
defect count data
In the case that an entire pipeline is divided into a finite
number of segments with equal length, the number of exter-
nal corrosion defects in each segment at a given time is
count data (non-negative integers). This section provides
some discussions regarding the statistical characteristics of
the defect count data, which will guide the selection of a
suitable statistical model.
2.1.1. Over-dispersion
Assume that the number of corrosion defects y on a pipe-
line segment follows a homogenous Poisson process:
e
k ky
P ð yÞ ¼ (1)
y!
in which k is the rate of the process. Poisson process
imposes a strong implicit assumption that the mean and

variance of the defect variable y are equal along the pipeline,
which conflicts with the observation of over-dispersed (i.e.
the observed variance of the defect count is higher than the
mean) corrosion count data in practice (Valor et al., 2015).
Mixed Poisson models are commonly employed to relax the
‘equal variance’ assumption and to address the over-disper-
sion difficulties (Grandell, 1997; Karlis & Xekalaki, 2007).
The probability mass function (PMF) of a Poisson mixture
can be expressed in the form:
ð 1
k y
e k
P ðy Þ ¼ g ðkÞdk (2)
0 y!
in which gðÞ is referred to as mixing probability density
function, which determines the density of rate k in the mix-
ture model. Let gðÞ be a gamma distribution or a lognormal
distribution, the corresponding mixed Poisson models turn
to the NB model and Poisson-lognormal (PLN) model
respectively.
2.1.2. Correlated spatial patterns of corrosion defects and
multivariate models
The spatial distribution of corrosion defects follows different
spatial patterns (Shibata, 2000). Some of the corrosion
defects randomly spread along the pipeline with a low local
density (i.e. referred to as random defects), while other
defects can distribute in an intensively clustered form (i.e.
referred to as clustered defects) (Cosham et al., 2007). The
random defects and clustered defects may cause damage to
pipeline structures at different severity levels but are highly
correlated since they may depend on the same set of
observed and unobserved explanatory variables.
To be specific, clustered defects that are very close to
each other or even overlapped may cause more a severe
decrease in the strength of pipeline wall at local points than
those random defects (Benjamin et al., 2007; Silva et al.,
2007), thereby leading to a higher possibility of pipeline fail-
ure. Meanwhile, it has been reported that the presence of
the clustered defects is highly correlated with the propaga-
tion of random defects – the former may be transformed
from the latter under certain favourable environment
(Burstein, Pistorius, & Mattin, 1993; Williams, Stewart, &
Balkwill, 1994). Therefore, it seems unreasonable to neglect
such a strong correlation and to employ separate univariate
models for each type of defect data. Thus, multivariate
count data models are preferred since they can model
defects of different spatial patterns as distinct dependent
variables with consideration of their correlations.
From a practical point of view, adjacent originally
detected metal loss defects from ILIs can be usually com-
bined into small local clusters based on interaction rules in
customary industry practices. There are several different sets
of rules for interacting defects. For all of them, if metal loss
flaws are closer than pre-defined criteria, they are combined
into one large cluster. One of the rules is that ‘metal loss
defects are considered to interact if they are within one inch
(25.4 mm) in axial dimension or six times the nominal wall
thickness in the circumferential dimension’. The maximum
corrosion depth of the combined defects (usually considered
STRUCTURE AND INFRASTRUCTURE ENGINEERING 3
as a single metal loss event) is equal to the greatest depth of
the individual defects included in the cluster, and the length
of the metal loss event is equal to the total combined length
of the cluster.
The processed results are then reported in a spread sheet.
Therefore, as the data source is the processed spread sheet,
it is possible that some of the external corrosion defects are
actually local corrosion clusters and are reported as individ-
ual events. The spatial interaction between different local
clusters is still not clear. A simplified assumption is used
that all reported defects are individual corrosion defects.
Though this assumption is somewhat strong, the large-scale
spatial patterns of external corrosion events, which is the
focus of the current research, still can be well modelled
using the presented approach.
2.1.3. Unobserved heterogeneity
In statistical analysis, the deficiencies and the unknown var-
iations of the explanatory variables across the sample popu-
lation are referred to as unobserved heterogeneity. For the
corrosion defect count data, the soil corrosivity characteris-
tics can vary considerably along a pipeline segment, due to
the inherent heterogeneity of the surrounding soil. Such het-
erogeneity may not be fully reflected by the soil corrosivity
measurements since multiple measurements along the align-
ment of a given pipeline segment are averaged. In addition,
some other corrosion-related variables, such as sulphide
inclusions (Stewart & Williams, 1992; Wranglen, 1974) in
steel, are nearly impossible to measure in a macroscale ana-
lysis, thereby cannot be considered in a statistical corrosion
model. It has been noted that neglecting unobserved het-
erogeneity may lead to biased and inefficient estimations
of the model coefficients, which could further result in
erroneous inferences and predictions (Mannering,
Shankar, & Bhat, 2016).
Based on the discussion presented in this section, the
statistical model employed for analysing corrosion defects
should be able to tackle the over-dispersion for multivariate
defect count data with consideration of unobserved hetero-
geneity. Table 1 summarises the capabilities of the com-
monly used count data models, including Poisson model,
the NB model and the PLN model and their corresponding
multivariate versions – multivariate Poisson (MVP) model
(Kocherlakota & Kocherlakota, 2004), the multivariate nega-
tive binomial (MVNB) model (Winkelmann, 2000) and the
MVPLN model (Chib & Winkelmann, 2001). It can be
noticed that, as a multivariate mixed Poisson process,
MVPLN model can address over-dispersion for multivariate
count data. Moreover, compared with the MVNB model
that allows only non-negative correlations (Winkelmann,
2008) between different spatial patterns, the MVPLN model
allows a more general correlation structure (both positive
and negative). In addition, MVPLN model provides a simple
and flexible way to address the unobserved heterogeneity for
defect count data by introducing the latent variables. Due to
the attractive features of the MVPLN model, it is adopted in
this study for modelling the corrosion defect count data.
4 X. WANG ET AL.

Table 1. Comparison of the capabilities of the commonly used count data models.
Features
Models Over-dispersion Multivariate data General correlation Unobserved heterogeneity
Univariate Poisson model No No No No
Univariate negative binominal model Yes No No No
Univariate Poisson-lognormal model Yes No No Yes
Multivariate Poisson model No Yes No No
Multivariate negative binominal model Yes Yes No No
Multivariate Poisson-lognormal model Yes Yes Yes Yes

ðY
2.2. The MVPLN model s
 
Pðyi xi , b, RÞ ¼ fP yij jeij , xi , bj us ðei 0, RÞdei (7)
In this section, a brief introduction to the MVPLN model is j¼1
provided. More detailed information on this model can be
found in Chib and Winkelmann (2001). Let n correspond to where fP ðÞ denotes the Poisson PMF, and us ðÞ denotes the
the number of pipeline segments and s correspond to the s-variate normal density function. As this multiple integral
total number of different spatial patterns (i.e. s ¼ 2 when cannot be solved in a closed form, the MCMC simulation
random defect and clustered defects are considered in this approach is employed to estimate the unknown parameter
study) of the corrosion defects. Let yi ¼ ðyi1 , :::, yis Þ denote under the Bayesian inferential framework.
to the defect counts of s spatial patterns in pipeline segment Due to the lack of sufficient prior knowledge of the dis-
i ði ¼ 1, 2, :::, nÞ: Let ei ¼ ðei1 , :::, eis Þ denote the s spatial pat- tributions for bj and R, their prior distributions can be
tern-specific latent effects for pipeline segment i: Let xi ¼ specified as frequently employed vague (less-informative)
ðxi1 , :::, xik Þ denote the k-dimensional explanatory variables priors. Specially, it is assumed that bj and R
1 independ-
 
for pipeline segment i: Let bj ¼ b1j , :::, bkj T denote the ently follow a multivariate normal distribution and a
model coefficients of the k-dimensional explanatory varia- Wishart distribution (Chib & Winkelmann, 2001), respect-
bles for spatial pattern j ðj ¼ 1, 2, :::, sÞ: Assume that, condi- ively:
tional on the latent effects eij , the explanatory variables xi  
and the corresponding coefficients bj , the defect counts yij bj  uk b0 , B
1
0 , R
1  fW ðr0 , R0 Þ (8)
follows a Poisson distribution:
  where uk is the k-variate normal density and fW is the
yij jeij , xi , bj  Poisson kij (3)  
Wishart density, and b0 , B
1 0 , r0 , R0 are the associated
where hyperparameters: b0 is the mean vector of the k-variate nor-
kij ¼ expðxi  bj þ eij Þ (4) mal density, B0 is the covariance matrix of the k-variate
normal density, r0 is the degree of freedom of the Wishart
for i ¼ 1, 2, :::, n and j ¼ 1, 2, :::, s: In MVPLN model, the density and R0 is the scale matrix of the Wishart density.
latent effects ei are assumed to be uncorrelated with the Then, according to the Bayes’ theorem, the joint posterior
explanatory variables xi and follow an s-dimensional multi- density is proportional to the product of prior probability
variate normal distribution with a mean vector 0 and an and likelihood probability:
unrestricted variance–covariance matrix, expressed as
ei jR  Ns ð0, RÞ (5) Posterior / prior  likelihood
  n ðY
Y
where
s
 
¼ uk b0 , B
1 f ð R , r Þ fP yij jeij , xi , bj us ðei 0, RÞdei
2 3 0 W 0 0
r11 r12 ::: r1s i¼1 j¼1
6 r21 r22 ::: r2s 7 (9)
6 7
R¼6 .. .. .. .. 7 (6)
4 . . . . 5 The above joint posterior can then be simulated by itera-
rs1 rs2    rss tively sampling from three conditional posterior distribu-
and tions:
rij ¼ rji ; fori, j 2 ð1, 2, :::, sÞ:
pðR
1 eÞ; pðeY, X, b, RÞ; pðbY, X, e, RÞ, (10)
3 2 2 3 2 3
2.3. Parameter estimation via MCMC simulation e1 x1 y
6 .. 7 6 .. 7 6 .1 7
where e ¼ 4 . 5, b ¼ ½b1 :::bs , X ¼ 4 . 5, Y ¼ 4 .. 7
6
5:
The likelihood function of the MVPLN model is the product
en xn yn
of the marginal distributions Pðyi xi , b, RÞ with regard to ei ,
which can be expressed as an s-variate integration of the The sampling process consists of three steps, which are sam-
Poisson distribution with respect to the distribution of ei : pling R
1 , e and b, accordingly.
 STRUCTURE AND INFRASTRUCTURE ENGINEERING 5

2.3.1. Sampling R
1 Although iterative MCMC simulation is required for esti-
The full conditional posterior distribution of R
1 can be mating the MVPLN model, it is worth to mention that the
expressed as model framework enables sampling ei and bj in parallel
 Y
n schemes, thereby significantly reducing the computation
pðR
1 eÞ / fW R
1 R0 , r0 us ðei 0, RÞ (11) time (Zhan, Aziz, & Ukkusuri, 2015). During the MCMC
i¼1 simulation, a certain number of burn-in iterations are used
By combining terms, the above posterior density can be to monitor the convergence. Trace plots of the generated
rewritten as a new Wishart distribution: sample are inspected to ensure that the sample values pro-
0 " #
1 1 duce no significant periodicities or tendencies exist by
X n   the end of the burn-in period. The generated samples in the
pðR
1 eÞ  fW @n þ r0 , R
1
0 þ ei eTi A (12) burn-in period are discarded, and the inferences on the
i¼1
model parameters can be directly made using the remaining
Hence, this known parametric distribution can be samples. The corresponding mean and standard deviations
sampled using a Gibbs sampler. of each posterior distribution are calculated; the 2.5th and
97.5th percentiles are used to construct the 95% cred-
ible interval.
2.3.2. Sampling e
As the closed-form density of the conditional posterior
density of e, i.e. pðeY, X, b, RÞ, is not available, the values 3. Real-world pipeline corrosion data description
of e are sampled using the Metropolis–Hastings (M-H) algo- and pre-processing
rithm (Chib & Greenberg, 1995). According to Chib and
3.1. General data information
Winkelmann (2001), the multivariate t distribution
with degrees of freedom ve (i.e. ve is employed as a tuning To demonstrate the use of the MVPLN model for analysing
parameter in the M-H algorithm, which makes the accept- corrosion defect data, the proposed model is applied in a
ance
 rate lie between 20 and 45 per cent), given as real-life data-set collected from a transporting pipeline sys-
fT ei j^e i , V^e i , ve , is employed as the proposal density distri- tem (Wang et al., 2015b; Yajima, Rivera, et al., 2015;
bution. Here, e^i is obtained by maximising the posterior Yajima, Wang, Liang, & Castaneda, 2015). The pipeline was
probability for ei based on Newton-Raphson algorithm: originally installed in 1969, using steel pipes with a diameter
  of 457.2 mm (18 inch) and a wall thickness of 6.41 mm
^e i ¼ arg max lnpðei yi , xi , b, RÞ (13)
(0.252 inch). ILI was conducted for this pipeline in 2010
and V^e i ¼ ð
H^e i Þ
1 is the inverse of minus the Hessian using ultrasonic smart pigging system, which has a measure-
matrix of lnpðei yi , xi , b, RÞ given ^e i : A proposal value ei ment threshold of 5% pipe wall thickness. The total length
 
drawn from fT ei j^e i , V^e i , v is accepted with probability: of the inspected pipeline interval was about 110 km, along
(   ) which a total of 1892 external defects were detected and
pðei yi , xi , b, RÞfT ei j^e i , V^e i , ve reported by processing the raw ILI signals. The inspected
min  ,1 (14)
pðei yi , xi , b, RÞfT ei j^e i , V ^e i , ve pipeline interval was analysed by dividing it into segments
with an equal length of 200 m. Soil corrosivity surveys were
carried out for each of these segments to measure the corro-
2.3.3. Sampling b sivity factors of the surrounding soil of each segment. After
Similar to the sampling of e, the H-M algorithm is performing correlation analysis, parameters that were
employed to sample b: Again, the multivariate t distribution strongly correlated with some other parameters were
  excluded. A total number of seven soil corrosivity variables,
^
with degrees of freedom vb , given as fT bj jb j , V b^ j , vb , is i.e. half-cell potential, resistivity, pH, concentrations of
employed as the proposal density distribution of bj , with chloride ion (Cl
), carbonate ion (CO2
3 ), bicarbonate ion
^ j obtained by maximising the posterior probability for
the b (HCO
3 ) and sulphate ion (SO 2

4 ), are considered as
bj based on Newton-Raphson algorithm: explanatory variables in this study.
^ j ¼ arg maxln pbj Y j , X j , ej , b
j , R
b (15)
3.2. Identifying the corrosion defect patterns
where Y j , X j and ej denote the jth column of matrix Y, X
and e, respectively; b
j denotes the components of b other To build a multivariate model accounting for corrosion
defects with different spatial patterns in a probabilistic man-
than bj : The sampling of b is then conducted by sampling
ner, it is required to classify the defects base on their associ-
its components bj one at a time, with the acceptance prob- ated spatial patterns (i.e. random or clustered) and to
ability of a proposal bj as
8     9 acquire the classified defect counts for each pipeline seg-
>
<p bj Y j , X j , ej , b
j , R fT bj jb^ j , V ^ , vb >
= ment. This can be implemented by analysing the distribu-
bj
min     , 1 (16) tion of interval distance between neighbouring defects (i.e.
> ^ j , V ^ , vb
: p bj Y j , X j , ej , b
j , R fT bj jb >
;
j b also referred to as inter-arrival time in case Poisson proc-
esses are used for modelling time sequential events). The
6 X. WANG ET AL.

Figure 1. Histogram of the interval distance between neighbouring defect; the empirical CDF of the observed distribution and the CDF of the estimated
exGPD mixture.

interval distance distribution is shown in Figure 1. Given
that the counts of both random defects and clustered defects
in a pipeline segment follow respective mixed Poisson distri-
butions, the interval distance between neighbouring random
defects and clustered defects can be considered as exponen-
tial mixtures, which can be modelled using exponentiated
generalised Pareto distributions (exGPDs) (Ali, 2017;
Nadarajah, 2005):

1
1
1 nx ð n Þ
fexGPD ðxjr, nÞ ¼ 1þ (17)
r r
in which ðr, nÞ 2 H are distribution parameters. In this way,
the distribution of the interval distance d between neighbor-
ing defects can be considered as a mixture of two exGPDs
with the expression:
PðdÞ ¼ afexGPD
r
ðHr Þ þ ð1
aÞfexGPD
c
ð Hc Þ
r
in which fexGPD ðÞ and fexGPD
c
ðÞ represent the distribution
of interval distance for random defects and clustered
defects, respectively; and a donates the weight of the mix-
ture distribution. Given the formation shown in Equation
(18), the maximum-likelihood estimates (MLEs) of a, Hr
and Hc can be inferred utilising an iterative maximisation-
expectation algorithm.
As shown in Figure 1, the obtained estimation results
(listed in Table 2) lead to a Kolmogorov–Smirnov (K–S)
test p value of 0.642 with the non-hypothesis (i.e. the inter-
val distances follow an exGPD distribution), which indicates
that the exGPD mixture model is satisfactory for modelling
the distribution of interval distances. A critical distance d
of 0.364 m can be obtained by solving the following equa-
tion:
afexGPD
r
ðd , Hr Þ ¼ ð1
aÞfexGPD
c
ð d  , Hc Þ
If the spatial distance between a given defect and its
nearest neighbouring defect is smaller than d , the given
defect is more likely to be a defect with a clustered pattern;
otherwise, it is considered as a defect with a random pat-
tern. In this way, the total number of 1892 external corro-
sion defects can be identified as 1180 random defects and
712 clustered defects. Figure 2 shows the numbers of both
random and clustered defects in each 200-m segment along
the investigated 110-km pipeline. Table 3 contains summary
statistics of the defect counts and the measured soil corro-
sivity explanatory variables.
It should be mentioned that the segments do not have to
be in equal length. The reason for the current setting is that
the severity of corrosion herein is defined as the number of
defects per segment. If segments with various lengths are
used, the associated defect numbers are not comparable, yet
the severity could be evaluated using the effective area (i.e.
the ratio between the corroded area and the area of
the segment).
(18)
4. Modelling validation and discussions
In this section, the performance of the proposed MVPLN
model is assessed for predicting the real-world pipeline
defect count data using cross-validation. A comparison
study is then conducted to compare the modelling results
obtained using the developed MVPLN model with other
existing defect count models. Furthermore, a thorough dis-
cussion of the estimated correlations is provided between
different spatial patterns of corrosion defects and the
obtained model coefficients. Finally, an illustrative case is
presented to demonstrate the use of the proposed MVPLN
model for predicting corrosion severity for the non-piggable
pipeline segments.
(19) 4.1. Model validation
The entire defect count data set is split using ILI into five
equal-sized groups (non-piggable segments are excluded), as
shown in Figure 2, to conduct a fivefold cross-validation of
 STRUCTURE AND INFRASTRUCTURE ENGINEERING 7

Table 2. Estimation results of the exGPD mixture model.

Estimated distribution parameters
Interval distance distributions Shape parameter Scale parameter Weight factor
r
Random defects fexGPD 0.821 14.984 0.794
c
Clustered defects fexGPD 0.106 0.285 0.206
Critical distance d ¼ 0.364 K–S test p value ¼ 0.642

Figure 2. Distributions of defects with random and clustered patterns along the investigated pipeline.

Table 3. Descriptive statistics of defect counts and soil corrosivity measurements.

Variable description Mean Std. dev. Minimum Maximum
Dependent variables
Number of random defects per segment 2.12 3.26 0 18
Number of clustered defects per segment 1.28 4.01 0 53

Soil corrosivity characteristics

Redox potential (Eh) –249.98 60.94 –395 50
Resistivity (@1 m) (ohm.cm) 1.55  104 3.27  104 452.39 3.08  104
pH value 5.47 0.93 2 7.6
Cl
ion concentration (mmol/L) 3.18 1.21 0.75 10.25
CO2

3 ion concentration (mmol/L) 0.92 0.80 0 5.33
HCO
3 ion concentration (mmol/L) 2.87 1.94 0 15.91
SO2

4 ion concentration (mmol/L) 0.10 0.20 0.04 2.81

the proposed MVPLN model. In each validation step, one
data group is used as the test set, and the remaining four
groups are used as the training set. Note that the count data
samples are grouped according to their spatial sequence
along the alignment of the pipeline, instead of being reor-
dered and sampled randomly. Such a partition strategy is
adopted because the generated test set has a similar spatial
distribution to the non-piggable pipeline segments, which
are typically contiguous blocks, rather than sparse points,
along the pipeline alignment. In each validation step, an
MVPLN model is trained using the training set based on
the MCMC simulation process presented in Section 3.2. To
be more specific, a total number of 50,000 MCMC samples
were drawn, and the latter 30,000 samples were used to con-
struct the probability density functions of the sampled
model coefficients.
Multiple MCMC chains with different initial values were
simulated to ensure that the estimated model coefficients
converged to the same set of posterior means. Then for the
test set, the probability distributions of the defect counts
with both random and clustered patterns can be calculated
based on the trained MVPLN model. As mentioned above,
the corrosion process involves various uncertainties, and the
estimation of defect counts may be impacted by the unob-
served factors. As a result, the obtained probability distribu-
tions of defect counts may possess considerable variations.
Therefore, to better describe the obtained modelling results,
two types of estimates of defect counts are provided for val-
idation. The first type of estimates is the median values of
the obtained probability distributions of defect counts. The
second type of estimates is the 90% quantile values of the
obtained probability distributions, which can be considered
as an upper bound of the predicted defect counts with a
90% confidence level.
The results of the conducted fivefold cross-validation are
shown in Figure 3, in which for each validation case, the
estimated defect counts with random and clustered patterns
are plotted versus their true values in the respective
8 X. WANG ET AL.
scatterplots. The root-mean-square errors (RMSEs) of the
estimated counts with respect to the measured count data
are calculated for both the training set and the test set. It
can be noted from Figure 3 that in all the validation cases,
both the training set and the test set (i.e. estimated median
values) are scattered around the ideal 1:1 reference line (i.e.
the 45-degree line), which indicates the defect count data
are generally well predicted by the constructed MVPLN
models. Most of the estimated upper bound values are
located above the reference line. Hence, it seems that the
use of the 90% percentile values of the estimated defect
count distribution is generally conservative.
For the random defect count, the RMSEs of the training
sets vary from 0.7549 to 0.9477 in the five validation cases,
which are close to RMSEs of the test sets that vary from
0.9131 to 1.2714. For the clustered defect count, higher
RMSEs are observed for both training sets (vary from
1.2783 to 1.8143) and testing sets (vary from 1.3520 to
2.4475). This is expected since count data of clustered
defects possess much higher variance. Moreover, by compar-
ing the five validation cases, it can be noted that the model
performance for modelling test set #5 is slightly inferior to
the model performance for the other test sets, indicated by
larger differences in RMSEs between the training sets and
test sets for both random defects and clustered defects. As
marked in Figure 3e, for certain extreme events in test set
#5, the true defect counts are not covered by the estimated
90% confidence intervals.
The modelling of test set #5 may be affected by several
reasons. First, it can be noted from Figure 2 that the defect
count data in group #5 have both much larger values and
variations than the first four groups. In this way, estimating
the defect count data of group #5 using the first four groups
as a training set is essentially an extrapolation problem that
is typically more challenging. Another hypothesis is that the
extreme events that occurred in group #5 are caused by cer-
tain local factors (e.g. material defect, coating damage dur-
ing construction) that are not considered in the constructed
MVPLN model. Therefore, for practical problems, it is sug-
gested to include more data samples to avoid the extrapola-
tion analysis; otherwise, extra attention should be paid for
modelling the extreme events. Yet for most of the data points
in the test set #5, the constructed MVPLN model still pro-
vides reasonable estimates with decent accuracy. In general,
the feasibility and accuracy of the developed MVPLN model
for modelling real-world pipeline corrosion count data are
well demonstrated by the presented cross-validation.
4.2. Model comparison
In this section, the performance of the proposed MVPLN
model further compared with the existing commonly used
statistical models for count data, including the univariate
Poisson-lognormal (UVPLN) model, the univariate Negative
Binomial (UVNB) model and the univariate Poisson model.
For comparison purposes, the entire pipeline defect count
data set is used as the training set for all the candidate mod-
els. The MVPLN model is constructed using the same
approach as described in the previous section. The statistics
of the estimated coefficients are presented in Table 4 for
defects with both random and clustered patterns. The
obtained probability density functions of the sampled coeffi-
cient values are further plotted in Figure 4, which provides
a more intuitive representation of the differences between
the model coefficients associated with the two spatial pat-
terns. The estimation results of the latent components in the
MVPLN model are presented in Table 5. The obtained esti-
mation results are listed in Table 6, together with the model
coefficients estimated using other candidate models.
It can be noticed from Table 6 that for defects with ran-
dom pattern all the four models give generally similar
results in terms of the mean value of the estimated model
coefficients and their significance, except for the variable
‘Cl
ion concentration’, which is identified as insignificant
in the univariate Poisson model. For the defects with a clus-
tered pattern, however, the univariate Poisson model pro-
vides significantly different (in terms of both coefficient
estimates and significance) results from those of the other
three models. It appears that under the univariate Poisson
model, the variables ‘Resistivity (@1 m)’, ‘Cl
ion concentra-
tion’ and ‘CO2
3 ion concentration’ are incorrectly declared
to be insignificant, leading to seriously overestimated stand-
ard variation of the other coefficients. Such biased estimated
results can be attributed to the strong over-dispersed count
data; it is known that the more over-dispersion there is, the
more seriously biased standard errors are estimated under
the univariate Poisson model. In this case, the true uncer-
tainties cannot be well represented, and the corresponding
interval estimates may not able to capture the true model
coefficients.
MVPLN, UVPLN and UVNB models can account for
over-dispersion, and thereby providing model coefficients of
generally consistent significance and standard errors that
reflect the true model uncertainties. It can be noticed that
the quantified uncertainty of the model coefficients from the
MVPLN model is noticeably smaller than those from the
UVPLN model and UVNB model. It indicates that the epi-
stemic uncertainty estimated by the MVPLN model is lower
than that estimated from the UVPLN model and UVNB
model. The superiority of the MVPLN model can be further
demonstrated by comparing the log-likelihood evaluated at
the posterior mean of model coefficients. The MVPLN
model provides a total log-likelihood value of –1728.27,
which is 281.45, 301.01 and 975.84 greater than the sum of
the two log-likelihood values from the univariate UVPLN
model, the UVNB model and the univariate Poisson model,
respectively. In addition, since the estimation of both the
MVPLN model and the UVPLN model involves MCMC
simulation, the deviance information criteria (DIC), which
is a commonly used measure of the goodness of fit in
Bayesian statistics with consideration of the model complex-
ity, is also computed for these two models.
As can be found in Table 6, a significant drop of 386.06
in DIC value is observed for the MVPLN model (4,847.26)
compared with the UVPLN model (5,233.32), which indi-
cates the MVPLN model provides a better fit compared
 STRUCTURE AND INFRASTRUCTURE ENGINEERING 9

Figure 3. Fivefold cross-validation results (a)–(e): validation cases #1–#5.

10 X. WANG ET AL.

Table 4. Estimates of the model coefficients for the developed MVPLN model.
Random defects Clustered defects
Variable description Mean Std. dev. 95% CI Mean Std. dev. 95% CI
Constant 0.553 0.0465 0.459 0.648 –0.145 0.0597 –0.260 –0.0262
Soil corrosivity characteristics
Redox potential –0.451 0.0459 –0.542 –0.360 –0.513 0.0581 –0.628 –0.397
Resistivity @1m –0.114 0.0357 –0.184 –0.0413 –0.108 0.0489 –0.208 –0.00861
pH value –0.306 0.0519 –0.409 –0.204 –0.284 0.0684 –0.419 –0.147
Cl
ion concentration 0.111 0.0496 0.015 0.208 0.518 0.0558 0.408 0.629
CO2

3 ion concentration –0.0641 0.0418 –0.148 0.0162 –0.308 0.0554 –0.421 –0.199
HCO
3 ion concentration –0.198 0.0476 –0.294 –0.102 –0.403 0.0765 –0.583 –0.277
2

SO4 ion concentration 0.0754 0.0414 –7.36e3 0.158 0.0573 0.0613 –0.0731 0.169

Summary statistics
Log-likelihood ¼ –1728.27 DIC ¼ 4847.26
1. Significant (at a ¼ 0.05) variables are shown in bold.
2. 95% credible interval is used to inspect whether the coefficients differ from zero in a statistically significant way, which is computed as the region that con-
tains 95% (2.5%–97.5%) sampled coefficient values.

Figure 4. Probability density distributions of the sampled model coefficients for the developed MVPLN model.

Table 5. Estimates of the covariance matrix and the correlation of the to train a corrosion degradation model via a Mixed-L
evy
latent effects. approach (Amaya-G
omez, Riascos-Ochoa, et al., 2019)
Variables Mean Std. dev. 95% CI under a pressure-stress failure criterion, which is, then, used
r11 (random pattern) 0.883 0.114 0.684 1.135 in turn, to develop a dynamic segmentation strategy. This
r12 , r21 0.943 0.136 0.707 1.229
r22 (clustered pattern) 1.334 0.188 1.006 1.740 strategy aims at identifying optimal intervention times and
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
correlation qor12 = r11 r22 0.869 8.478  10
3 0.850 0.883 locations by taking failure mechanism, corrosion temporal
evolution and corrosion spatial distribution (i.e. isolated and
with the UVPLN model. The large drop in DIC value is grouped) into consideration. Compared with this dynamic
likely related to the high level of correlation between count segmentation strategy, the presented approach in this work
data of the two different defect patterns. The absolute differ- only focuses on the spatial distribution modelling of corro-
ence between the estimated defect counts of each pipeline sion defects based on a static segmentation of 200 m. The
segment obtained using the developed MVPLN model and presented MVPLN model cannot provide any information
the corresponding true value is plotted in Figure 5. The sta- regarding failure probability or critical segment, while which
tistics presented above demonstrate that the MVPLN model can be quantitatively assessed using the dynamic segmenta-
outperforms the tested univariate models in modelling cor- tion approach. In addition, the proposed MVPLN model is
rosion defect count data with multiple correlated patterns, developed in the context of pipeline external corrosion and
in which cases using univariate models may lead to less hence, the effects generated by the corrosive soil environ-
accurate estimates of model coefficients and even seriously ment have been extensively investigated. In contrast, the
biased estimations of the corrosion severity. dynamic segmentation approach purely depends on the ILI
Most recently, the so-called dynamic segmentation was data and hence is suitable for both internal and external
proposed by Amaya-G
omez, S
anchez-Silva, and Mu~ noz pipeline corrosion assessments without information on the
(2019). This approach uses information obtained from ILI corrosive environment.
 STRUCTURE AND INFRASTRUCTURE ENGINEERING 11

Table 6. Model coefficients estimation results for the MVPLN model and the other commonly used univariate models.
Multivariate Poisson- Univariate Poisson- Univariate negative
Pattern Variable lognormal model lognormal model binomial model Univariate Poisson model
Random Constant 0.553(0.0465) 0.545(0.0569) 0.541(0.0504) 0.531(0.0776)
Redox potential –0.451(0.0459) –0.472(0.0507) –0.388(0.0452) –0.444(0.0830)
Resistivity @1m –0.114(0.0357) –0.109(0.0368) –0.101(0.0377) –0.116(0.0575)
pH value –0.306(0.0519) –0.356(0.0493) –0.410(0.0591) –0.264(0.0694)
Cl
ion concentration 0.111(0.0496) 0.103(0.0462) 0.113(0.0485) 0.0119(0.0895)
CO2

3 ion concentration –0.0641(0.0418) –0.0511(0.0411) –0.0523(0.0511) –0.00877(0.0751)
HCO
3 ion concentration –0.198(0.0476) –0.209(0.0535) –0.175(0.0435) –0.178(0.0684)
2

SO4 ion concentration 0.0754(0.0414) 0.0882(0.0499) 0.0719(0.0422) 0.0604(0.0677)
Log-likelihood – –1051.92 –1094.67 –1351.89
Clustered Constant –0.145(0.0597) –0.140(0.0600) –0.139(0.0674) –0.0270(0.0941)
Redox potential –0.513(0.0581) –0.491(0.0626) –0.429(0.0602) –0.531(0.1045)
Resistivity @1m –0.108(0.0489) –0.112(0.0599) –0.0880(0.0815) –0.179(0.1051)
pH value –0.284(0.0684) –0.280(0.0665) –0.274(0.0631) –0.439(0.1110)
Cl
ion concentration 0.518(0.0558) 0.494(0.0581) 0.424(0.0583) 0.195(0.1133)
2

CO3 ion concentration –0.308(0.0554) –0.245(0.0602) –0.279(0.0588) –0.135(0.1429)
HCO
3 ion concentration –0.430(0.0765) –0.522(0.0885) –0.415(0.0695) –0.405(0.1055)
SO2

4 ion concentration 0.0573(0.0613) 0.0755(0.0622) 0.163(0.0677) 0.0695(0.1547)
Log-likelihood – –957.8 –934.61 –1352.22
Summary statistics
Total Log-likelihood –1728.27 –2009.72 –2029.28 –2704.11
DIC 4847.26 5233.32 – –
1. Significant (at a ¼ 0.05) variables are shown in bold.
2. Numbers in parentheses represent posterior standard deviations of the estimates of model coefficients.
3. The univariate Poisson-lognormal model was implemented using a full Bayesian approach (Miaou, Song, & Mallick, 2003).
4. The univariate Poisson model and univariate negative binomial model were implemented in SAS.

4.3. Latent effects and their correlation across
defect patterns
Estimates of the covariance matrix and the correlation of
the latent effects of the MVPLN model are presented in
Table 5. The posterior mean of the correlation between
defect counts with different spatial patterns is found to be
0.869, with a 95% credible interval of (0.850, 0.883). This
estimated correlation supports the intuition that there exists
a highly significant correlation between defect counts of two
spatial patterns. Such a strong correlation might due to the
underlying corrosion mechanisms. To be more specific, it is
well acknowledged that localised pitting corrosion, regard-
less of the spatial pattern, is preceded by the appearance of
metastable pitting, which may transit to stable pit through a
stochastic procedure (Burstein et al., 1993). In this way, it is
likely that the nucleation of defects, regardless of their spa-
tial patterns, may depend on certain common corrosiv-
ity variables.
In addition, it is reported that metastable pits can influ-
ence each other in space through the release of aggressive
ions that weaken the protective oxide layers, and such inter-
action may further enhance the nucleation and stabilisation
of metastable pits. Therefore, to some extent, the randomly
located defects can be considered as an intermediate state of
the formation of the clustered defects under certain favour-
able environment. Thus, the strong correlation between the
defect counts of the two spatial patterns is reasonable.
Therefore, as with any statistical models, such a strong cor-
relation of defect count between different spatial patterns
needs to be incorporated into the model framework.
4.4. Estimates of model coefficients
Generally, as presented in Figure 4, the model coefficients
corresponding to the clustered corrosion pattern have flatter
posterior distributions. From a Bayesian perspective, this is
mainly because that the number of events identified as clus-
tered defects is fewer (i.e. 1180 random defects and 712
clustered defects); thereby, the sampled coefficients have
larger variations. Table 4 provides the model parameter esti-
mates, their corresponding standard deviation and 95%
credible intervals for the random corrosion defect and clus-
tered corrosion defect count model under the
MVPLN framework.
In the developed MVPLN model, redox potential is iden-
tified as the most significant factor that contributes nega-
tively to the defect counts compared with the other six
factors related to soil properties. Redox potential is an indi-
cator of electrochemical corrosion reactivity. To some
extent, the lower the redox potential, the higher the prob-
ability of active corrosion (Jones, 1996). This is consistent
with the negative coefficient:
0.451 for random defects and
–0.513 for clustered defects.
Resistivity@1m, pH value, concentrations of chloride


ion, CO2
3 ion, HCO3 ion and sulphate ion are the meas-
ured parameters related to soil properties. Amongst them,
pH value has the most negative coefficient –0.306 for ran-
dom defects, which agrees with the fact that more acid soils
have a higher risk of corrosion in buried metallic structures.
The external corrosion rate of pipeline decreases with an
increase in pH value of soil (Abbas, Norman, & Charles,
2018). A similar value of –0.284 is also observed for clus-
tered defect counts.
The concentration of chloride ion is identified as the
most significant factor for clustered defect counts with a
mean value of 0.518. The mean value of the model coeffi-
cient of chloride concentration for random defects is 0.111,
which is also significant. Different from the negative coeffi-
cients from redox potential and pH value, the model coeffi-
cient for chloride concentration is positive to the count of
12 X. WANG ET AL.
Figure 5. Absolute residuals of the MVPLN model (a) defects with random spa-
tial pattern; (b) defects with clustered spatial pattern.
both the random and clustered defects. These are expected
results since chloride plays a key role in the nucleation and
propagation of pitting corrosion of carbon steels (Cheng,
Wilmott, & Luo, 1999; Tang et al., 2013). As the amount of
chloride accumulates to a threshold at the steel surface, the
passive film breaks down and stable pitting corrosion forms.
Moreover, clustered defects generally have a higher
chance of being attacked by chloride ion and hence are
more sensitive to the chloride ion concentration, which is
consistent with the fact that a high coefficient 0.518 is
observed for clustered defects than 0.111 from random
defects. In addition, it has been reported that metastable pit-
ting events can exert significant impacts on the nucleation
of future events in terms of cooperative stochastic behaviour
(Bertocci & Ye, 1984; Leckie & Uhlig, 1966; Wu, Scully,
Hudson, & Mikhailov, 1997). To be more specific, the
cooperative interaction of metastable pitting events may
occur at certain critical potential, which can lead to an auto-
catalytic explosion in the metastable pitting density and con-
sequent sudden rise in growth of pit density in a local
region (Cheng & Luo, 2000; Mikhailov, Jain, Organ, &
Hudson, 2006; Scully, Budiansky, Tiwary, Mikhailov, &
Hudson, 2008).
Carbon dioxide is one of the main chemical species that
cause internal corrosion of transmission pipeline, and exten-
sive research work has been conducted to study its mechan-
ism (Barker, Burkle, Charpentier, Thompson, & Neville,
2018; Javidi & Bekhrad, 2018). While for external corrosion


of pipeline, both CO2
3 ion and HCO3 ion are from the dis-
solved carbon dioxide in the soil pore solution, these two ions
react with the pipeline steel to form a layer of iron carbonate
(FeCO3 ) that adheres to the steel surface. This iron carbonate
layer gradually slows down the carbon dioxide and corrosion
rate, and consequently causes an increase in the concentrations


of CO2
3 and HCO3 ion in the soil. Therefore, negative model
coefficients are observed for both random and clustered defect
counts. These results are supported by existing experimental


findings that increases in CO2
3 and HCO3 ion concentrations
may result in an increased stability of the FeCO3 passive film
and a sequentially increased pitting potential (Lu, Huang,
Huang, & Yang, 2006; Mao, Liu, & Revie, 1994).
Moreover, compared with coefficients from random


defects (–0.0641 for CO2
3 ion and –0.198 for HCO3 ion),


the estimated coefficients of both HCO3 ion and CO2
3 ion
for clustered defects are more significant (–0.308 for CO2
3
ion and –0.403 for HCO
3 ion). This is probably because the


concentration of both CO2
3 ion and HCO3 ion is the aver-
age of many measured sites within one segment, the con-
centration of these two ions may be more sensitive to a
relatively large corrosion area, which could be the result of
clustered corrosion events.
Resistivity @1 m is identified as a less significant negative
factor with mean values of –0.114 and –0.108 for random
and clustered defect counts, respectively. The negative value
of these two coefficients indicates that an increase in the
soil resistivity will reduce the possibility of corrosion defects,
which is in agreement with experimental observation
(Bradford, 2000). However, it is important to note that soil
resistivity alone may not be enough to evaluate the chance
of pitting nucleation; for example, bacteria, dissimilar metals
or oxygen concentration cells may create severe corrosion in
high resistivity soil (Fitzgerald, 1989). This may explain the
relatively weak correlation between soil resistivity and defect
counts, compared with other explanatory variables.
Sulphate-reducing bacteria (SRB) are widely found in
soils and are important stains that cause microbiologically
influenced corrosion (MIC) (Li et al., 2018; Liu & Cheng,
2017). An increase in the concentration of sulphate ion will
increase corrosion activity, which is consistent with the
positive estimated coefficient: 0.0754 for random defect
counts and 0.0573 for clustered defect counts. However,
compared with other factors related to soil corrosivity, the
concentration of sulphate ion is the least significant. On one
hand, it is probably because the soil along the pipeline inves-
tigated in this study is not a favourable home for the growth
of SRB. On the other hand, in addition to the sulphate ion,
MIC also depends on other parameters such as pH, anaerobic
condition (low redox potential) and the existence of micro-
biological activity (Arriba-Rodriguez, Villanueva-Balsera,
Ortega-Fernandez, & Rodriguez-Perez, 2018).

Figure 6. (a) Estimated counts of defect with random pattern for the non-piggable segments; (b) estimated counts of defect with clustered pattern for the non-
piggable segments.
4.5. Estimating corrosion severity of non-piggable
pipeline segments
In this section, it will be demonstrated how the presented
approach can add value to the current pipeline maintenance
practices of the non-piggable pipeline systems. This model
is applied for modelling the first non-piggable pipeline
interval shown in Figure 2. This non-piggable pipeline inter-
val ranges from 11,000 to 23,000 m, which contains a total
number of 60 segments with an equal length of 200 m.
Figure 6 shows the estimated median value and upper
bound with a 95% confidence level of the estimated defect
counts for each segment. It can be noted, for the defects
with a random pattern, the estimated median counts and
the upper bound counts range from 0.447 to 3.881 and
from 1.964 to 16.985, respectively.
For the defects with a clustered pattern, the estimated
median counts and the upper bound counts range from
0.106 to 15.453 and from 1.002 to 74.332, respectively.
Slightly downward trends of the estimated defect counts can
be found along the alignment of the non-piggable pipeline
interval, indicating that the first half of the interval may
encounter a severer corrosion condition. Remarkable
median and upper bound of defect counts are obtained for
200-m segments starting at 11.8 and 14.8 km, suggesting
that these segments may require more attention during the
inspection and maintenance operations. These estimation
STRUCTURE AND INFRASTRUCTURE ENGINEERING 13
results demonstrate that the developed model can provide a
flexible alternative way to evaluate the external corrosion sever-
ity of non-piggable pipelines other than ditch excavation.
5. Conclusions
This study investigates the possibility of modelling pipeline
external corrosion defect count data with two correlated
corrosion patterns (i.e. random pattern and clustered pat-
tern) using a MVPLN model with the Markov chain Monto
Carlo (MCMC) algorithm as a computational engine for
Bayesian parameter inference. The developed MVPLM
model is applied to a data set consisting of external corro-
sion defect counts and corrosivity measurements of sur-
rounding soils along a 110-km-long buried oil
transportation. The performance of the developed model for
predicting real-world corrosion defect count is assessed
using cross-validation.
For comparison purposes, the same data-set was also
analysed using the UVPLN model, the UVNB model and
the univariate Poisson model. Analysis results demonstrated
that the MVPLN model generally provided a superior fit
over the univariate models, indicated by noticeably larger
log-likelihood value and smaller DIC value. Meanwhile, the
modelling results showed that the analysed defect count
data are highly over-dispersed, and there exists a strong
14 X. WANG ET AL.
correlation between the two different spatial patterns (i.e.
random and clustered defects). Such statistical features of
the real-life pipeline defect count data can be well modelled
and accommodated by the MVPLN model, resulting in a
significant improvement in the goodness of fit.
The rigorous modelling of the spatial distribution with
the MVPLN model can provide engineers with valuable
information regarding the mechanism of pitting corrosion.
The estimated model coefficients from the data-driven
approach were thoroughly discussed; the modelling results
were found in general consistent with corrosion mechanisms
reported in the literature. In addition, the constructed model
was further utilised to predict the corrosion defect counts
on the non-piggable pipeline segments. The presented
results demonstrated that the developed model provides a
feasible way of estimating the corrosion severity for the
non-piggable pipeline.
The results presented in this paper are based on a single
data set. Further research with different data sets is planned
to confirm the findings in this study. In addition, consider-
able latent effects have been observed in the developed
model, which lead to predictions of corrosion severity with
large uncertainty. In further studies, such uncertainty may
be mitigated by employing soil corrosivity measurements
with better precision (higher measure point density), as well
as by introducing additional quantifiable corrosion-related
variables into the model.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Funding
The corresponding author would like to acknowledge the School of
Engineering, The University of Dayton for the financial support to per-
form part of the work in this project. This work was also supported by
the DOT PHMSA Office of Pipeline Safety under Grant
693JK31910018POTA.
ORCID
Xiangrong Wang http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5618-8776
Hui Wang http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7970-6772
Fujian Tang http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3066-5041
Homero Castaneda http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9252-7744
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