Underground Construction - October 2019 - 37

pipeline installation. CCI pursued engineering, development, testing, and execution of TIPS in 2018 and
successfully installed the system in February of 2019.

fiber-optic line into the open conduit(s) as required.
In some cases, the fiber-optic cable was pre-loaded
prior to pipeline installation.

(-4F). All installations were completed successfully,
and the fiber-optic integrity was confirmed after
installation with not a single TIPS conduit/fiber loss.

TRENCHLESS INTEGRITY
PIPELINE SYSTEM (TIPS™)

SUCCESSFUL APPLICATION
OF TIPS™

CONCLUSION

TIPS consist of internal high-tensile steel
(0.5"/12.7mm diameter) conduit(s), encapsulated
in a robust monolithic extruded material, that are
arranged in a specific low-profile configuration
(0.75"/19.05mm tall), and is completely bonded
directly to the exterior of the pipeline. TIPS was
designed to withstand extreme operating conditions
(temperature and corrosion) and pass all current
engineering pipeline stress analysis while not
compromising the cathodic protection coating. This
low-profile TIPS conduit design is intended to provide a larger range of existing integrity monitoring usage, with an ease of installation, increase the success
rate of any trenchless and conventional installation,
provide a wider range of integrity detection (current
and future), and allow for installation of multiple
third-party integrity providers (Optical and other).
The most difficult challenge, beyond the overall
engineered design and material requirements of
TIPS, was the field bonding application. A comprehensive literature search was conducted to find
potential adhesive resin systems that could cure at
low temperatures. The commercial and scientific
literature revealed only systems that could cure at
0 to -10°C. Generally, these resins were from the
methacrylate and vinyl-ester groups. Methacrylate
adhesives break down in wet conditions at about
70°C, dissolve and disbond entirely under these
conditions in a matter of days if not hours. Vinyl-ester resins have relatively high chemical resistance
but are glassy as opposed to ductile. The chemistry
of vinyl-ester limits the means of curing agents. The
solution was found by working in epoxy formulation;
in particular, a unique novolac epoxy-based system.
It was also expected at the onset of the TIPS
development that the TIPS profile would be difficult
to adhere to the pipe. The TIPS profile is made of
thermoplastic urethane plastic (TPU). The solution
is to use a proprietary overwrap of the TIPS profile.
Using CCI patent technology developed to solve
these issues, a very robust method of attaching the
TIPS was developed and meets all the requirements
of the "Criteria for Good Adhesion".
The TIPS system for the Clients pipeline project
consisted of a dual conduit arrangement. The dual
conduit TIPS was fully bonded longitudinally to
each targeted pipeline on the pipeline outer surface
by injection mold prior to HDD pipe pull. Once
installed on the pipeline, the trenchless contractor
would pull in the pipeline (and its bonded TIPS)
until the pipeline is fully pulled into the trenchless
annular space. The successfully installed pipeline
would then expose the opposite ends of the TIPS
conduits and a third-party provider would install the
SPONSORED CONTENT

In February of 2019, TIPS was installed on the trenchless portions of the pipeline project. The longest
trenchless section was a 1,751 meter (5,745 ft)
Horizontal Directionally Drilled section under a major
water course in northwestern Saskatchewan. The
TIPS installed pipelines were an NPS 8" with a second
adjacent TIPS pipeline of NPS 20". Several smaller
trenchless crossings required TIPS as well. In all, just
under 13,000 meters (42,651 ft) of TIPS was prepared
for trenchless installation for this pipeline project.
During TIPS installation, temperatures ranged from
0C to -40C (32F to -40F) with most of the TIPS
bonding and pipe pulls occurring well below -20C

With the deployment of TIPS, it is now possible
to ensure a much higher degree of success with
pipeline fiber-optic installations in even the most
extreme pipeline environments (trenched or
trenchless, new or existing retro-fits). TIPS is also
capable of providing the pipeline industry with
increased monitoring capabilities such as slope
movement (axial strain and other geo-hazard
strain), with a unique focus on spatial micro-strain
measurements. Future success with these TIPS capabilities is expected to move the pipeline industry
from a more predictive, reactive risk analysis to an
active and accurate real-time risk definition in all
pipeline environments. *

UConOnline.com | OCTOBER 2019

http://www.horizontaltech.com/ http://www.UConOnline.com

Underground Construction - October 2019

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