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Overview of API 530 - Calculation of Heater Tube Thickness in Petroleum Refineries

API 530,

Calculation of Heater-tube Thickness in Petroleum Refineries, is an inspection

code, written and published by the American Petroleum Institute (API), to
establish recommendations and requirements for the procedures used for
calculating the required wall thickness of new tubes and associated component
fittings for petroleum-refinery heaters and determining design criteria for the
same. The first edition of the code was published in October of 1997 and the
most recent edition (7th Ed.) was released April 2015.

The procedures laid out in API 530 are specifically developed for the design of
refinery and related process-fired heater tubes (direct-fired, heat-absorbing
tubes within enclosures). On the other hand, they were not intended to be used
for the design or inspection of external piping. The standard also does not
specify recommendations or requirements for tube retirement thickness.

This national standard is adapted from and identical to the international

standard: ISO 13704, Petroleum and natural gas industries-Calculation of
heater-tube thickness in petroleum refineries.