There are many standards, recommended practices (RP) and guidelines available for subsea pipe-line integrity management (PIM). In all of these, inspection is a key part of managing the integrity of subsea pipelines. However, detailed coverage of risk-based inspection (RBI) and detailed inspection planning is limited in these standards, RPs and guidelines; optimization of inspection and inspection frequency is generally determined at operator’s discretion unless strictly regulated by authorities. Thus, there is a need to identify operator best practices and attempt to define a unified decision-making...
There are many standards, recommended practices (RP) and guidelines available for subsea pipe-line integrity management (PIM). In all of these, inspection is a key part of managing the integrity of subsea pipelines. However, detailed coverage of risk-based inspection (RBI) and detailed inspection planning is limited in these standards, RPs and guidelines; optimization of inspection and inspection frequency is generally determined at operator’s discretion unless strictly regulated by authorities. Thus, there is a need to identify operator best practices and attempt to define a unified decision-making process to optimize inspection and inspection frequencies. This document: • Summarizes the most relevant standards, RPs and guidelines with respect to RBI • Reports the findings from answered questionnaires and interviews with operators, and • Identifies potential paths forward to reach a unified inspection planning best practice