Objective The natural gas pipelines are large-scale, intricate, and open systems composed of multiple units, with a specialized focus on ensuring safe and reliable operation. Intensive research on pipeline system reliability has been conducted, gradually improving the system reliability index system and evaluation methodology. Nonetheless, the efficient determination method is still absent, having a significant impact on the practical engineering applications of the established reliability evaluation methods for natural gas pipeline systems.
Methods This paper introduces an approach to determine the target gas supply reliability of natural gas pipeline systems by assessing acceptable risks within their units. The methodology encompasses two key aspects: unit target reliability and system target gas supply reliability. To achieve this, a model for determining the target reliability of pipeline units has been constructed, incorporating both social and individual risks based on risk acceptability criteria and risk consequence calculation methods. Additionally, an evaluation method for gas supply reliability, utilizing a Monte Carlo simulation approach, has been developed. This method takes into account the random failures in crucial units of natural gas pipeline systems and the random fluctuations in gas sources and users' demands. By integrating these evaluation outcomes with the results of unit target reliability calculations, the target gas supply reliability of natural gas pipeline systems can be determined.
Results The proposed determination approach was applied to a natural gas pipeline system in China, yielding a target gas supply reliability of 0.999 383. By comparing it with the actual reliability of gas supply recorded at 0.999 404 through the statistics method on historical data, the evaluation demonstrated that this natural gas pipeline system surpassed the target gas supply reliability, indicating its capability to ensure safe and efficient pipeline transmission.
Conclusion The viability of the proposed determination methodology in evaluating the target gas supply reliability of natural gas pipeline systems has been verified through an application case. The study findings establish a technical groundwork for future studies focused on reliability improvement and optimization for natural gas pipeline systems.
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