Strength design principles for main gas pipelines

Selection of wall thickness of large-diameter and high-pressure gas pipelines not only affects the safety of pipelines, but also is related directly to the investment of pipeline engineering construction. In this paper, the commonly used strength design standards on the straight sections of main gas pipelines were reviewed and compared, including GB 50251-2015, ASME B31.8-2007, ГОСТР 55989-2014, ISO13623-2009 and CSA Z662-11-2011. Each standard was deeply analyzed from the aspects of design concept, application scope and technical advantages. Especially according to the characteristics that the yield strength ratio increases with the improvement of pipeline steel grades, the difference of different design standards on wall thickness were compared and analyzed. With the technological development of large-diameter and high-pressure gas pipelines, the pipeline materials of higher steel grade can be better characterized by the Russian standard which is established on the basis of wall thickness design principle of the material tensile strength.