Alumni Achievement Award

/in , /by

Structural Integrity’s Own HonoredGordon NACE 2021 | Corrosion in the Nuclear Power Industry” for ASM Handbook

Awarded to an alumnus/a for exceptional accomplishment and leadership in the nominee’s professional or vocational field, which brings distinction to themselves and honor to the university. The contribution(s) need not be publicly renowned but should represent important creative effort or accomplishment with significant impact and value.

Barry Gordon is one of the country’s leading experts in corrosion and materials issues in the nuclear power industry.  Upon completing his undergraduate and graduate degree in metallurgy and materials science, he began his career with Westinghouse Electric’s Bettis Atomic Power Laboratory before joining GE Nuclear Energy in San Jose. Currently, Barry is an associate with Structural Integrity Associates, Inc. His professional accomplishments include four patents, more than 85 technical papers and reports, a PE in Corrosion Engineering and a Corrosion Society Fellow. He has served as an expert witness before the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards and Atomic Safety Licensing Board. He also chaired and co-authored “Corrosion in the Nuclear Power Industry” for ASM Handbook, Volume 13C.

Active outside of his professional pursuits, Barry was the president of the Los Gatos Bicycle Racing Club, principal timpanist with the Saratoga Symphony. Barry’s relationship with his alma mater includes supporting two scholarships at CMU, serving as the San Jose chairperson of the CMU Admission Council and being an active member of the Andrew Carnegie Society and a lifetime member of the Order of the May.

Material Verification for Oil and Gas Clients Pipeline Integrity Solutions

News & Views, Volume 50 | Material Verification for Oil and Gas Clients

/in , , , , , /by

PIPELINE INTEGRITY SOLUTIONS

By:  Scott Riccardella and Roger Royer

Material Verification for Oil and Gas Clients Pipeline Integrity SolutionsOn October 1, 2019, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) published amendments to 49 CFR Parts 191 and 192 in the Federal Register, issuing Part 1 of the Gas Transmission Mega-Rule or “Mega-Rule 1”.  In advance of Mega-Rule 1, SI developed field protocol and supported leading industry research institutes in validating in-situ Material Verification (MV) methodologies.  SI has continued to provide MV consulting support to our clients in response to Mega-Rule 1, ranging from program development and implementation to in-situ field data collection and analysis. 

Various sections of Mega-Rule 1 require operators of natural gas transmission pipelines to ensure adequate Traceable, Verifiable, and Complete (TV&C) material records or implement a MV Program to confirm specific pipeline attributes including diameter, wall thickness, seam type, and grade. Operators are now required to define sampling programs and perform destructive (laboratory) or non-destructive testing to capture this information and take additional actions when inconsistent results are identified until a confidence level of 95% is achieved. Opportunistic sampling per population is required until completion of testing of one excavation per mile (rounded up to the nearest whole number). 

READ MORE

SI FatiguePRO for Hydrogen Fueling Station Assets - Vessel Life Cycle Management

News & Views, Volume 50 | SI FatiguePRO for Hydrogen Fueling Station Assets

/in , , , , /by

VESSEL LIFE CYCLE MANAGEMENT

By:  Erick Ritter and Daniel Peters

SI FatiguePRO for Hydrogen Fueling Station Assets - Vessel Life Cycle ManagementInitial introduction of many of the hydrogen fueling stations to support this rapidly growing demand were installed around 2010. There were many designs of cylinders developed and installed at that time, many with known limitations on the life of the equipment due to the high pressures involved and cyclic fatigue crack growth issues due to hydrogen embrittlement.  The designs were often kept relatively simple to lower their costs often with little or no considerations for in-service inspection or potential end of life considerations.  Others involved innovative designs with reinforcing wrapping to try to enhance the life of the vessels, but by doing so, these designs limited the access to the main cylinder wall for in-service inspection. 

Many of these vessels are now reaching or passing the design life established by ASME.  This is resulting in problems for operators of this equipment as some jurisdictions will not allow the vessels to operate beyond the design life without inspection or re-rating of the vessels to extend the fatigue life.  SI’s FatiguePRO is a commercial software solution which has been addressing this exact concern for over 25 years.

READ MORE

Reactor Vessel Integrity - Fracture Toughness Criteria

News & Views, Volume 50 | Reactor Vessel Integrity

/in , , , , /by

FRACTURE TOUGHNESS CRITERIA

By:  Tim Griesbach and Dan Denis

Reactor Vessel Integrity - Fracture Toughness CriteriaThe integrity of the nuclear reactor pressure vessel is critical to plant safety.  A failure of the vessel is beyond the design basis.  Therefore, the design requirements for vessels have significant margins to prevent brittle or ductile failure under all anticipated operating conditions.  The early vessels in the U.S. were designed to meet Section VIII of the ASME Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code and later Section III.  ASME Section III included requirements for more detailed design stress analyses also included a fracture mechanics approach to establish operating pressure-temperature heatup and cooldown curves and to assure adequate margins of safety against brittle or ductile failure incorporating the nil-ductility reference temperature index, RTNDT. This index is correlated to the material reference fracture toughness, KIC or KIa. 

Radiation embrittlement is a known degradation mechanism in ferritic steels, and the beltline region of reactor pressure vessels is particularly susceptible to irradiation damage.  To predict the level of embrittlement in a reactor pressure vessel, trend curve prediction methods are used for projecting the shift in RTNDT as a function of material chemistry and fluence at the vessel wall.  Revision 2 of this Regulatory Guide is being used by all plants for predicting RTNDT shift in determining heatup and cooldown limits and hydrostatic test limits.

READ MORE

TRU Compliance Equipment Testing Project Equipment Testing and Certification to Assess Risk

News & Views, Volume 50 | TRU Compliance Equipment Testing Project

/in , , , , /by

EQUIPMENT TESTING AND CERTIFICATION TO ASSESS RISK

By:  Katie Braman

Using a risk-based approach derived from various seismic standards from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, TRU and BC Hydro will develop a synthetic test motion in three axes, mount the equipment on a triaxial shake table at TRU’s testing partner’s facility, and test at increasing levels until various levels of damage are observed.

TRU Compliance Equipment Testing Project Equipment Testing and Certification to Assess RiskTRU Compliance, the accredited product certification body of Structural Integrity Associates, has been awarded a contract to assist BC Hydro in qualifying and better understanding the seismic vulnerability of critical equipment used to control its spillway gates.  As part of the larger efforts to seismically upgrade the John Hart, Ladore, and Strathcona dams along the Campbell River system on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, BC Hydro is procuring equipment that allows precise flow control of the water going over the spillway.  Reliable equipment is needed to prevent possible overtopping or having uncontrolled water flow through the spillway.

READ MORE      

Porting SI's ANACAP Concrete Model into LS-DYNA Advanced Structural Analysis

News & Views, Volume 50 | Porting SI’s ANACAP Concrete Model into LS-DYNA

/in , , , , , /by

ADVANCED STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS

By: Livia Mello and Shari Day

Porting SI's ANACAP Concrete Model into LS-DYNA Advanced Structural AnalysisOne of Structural Integrity Associates’ (SI) strengths is combining state-of-the-art software with material science expertise to solve difficult structural and mechanical problems. A notable example in recent years is the Aircraft Impact Analysis (AIA) performed by SI for NuScale Power, using the ANACAP concrete material model. With SI’s support, NuScale’s Small Modular Reactor (SMR) building design passed NRC’s comprehensive inspection, bringing NuScale’s SMR technology one step closer to market [N&V Vol. 47 p. 5].

SI’s success in AIA is due not only to our team’s capabilities but also due to the capabilities of our proprietary concrete constitutive model, ANACAP, developed by Joe Rashid, Robert Dunham, and Randy James of ANATECH, now part of SI. Modeling reinforced concrete, which is both nonhomogeneous and anisotropic, is often a challenge in advanced structural analysis. However, ANACAP has a long track record of accurately capturing nonlinear concrete response in structural systems subjected to static, impact, and seismic loads. Its application goes beyond AIA; it has also been utilized in several of SI’s commercial building, bridge infrastructure, nuclear plant, and hydroelectric facility projects.

ANACAP has the ability to account for cyclic degradation, multi-axial cracking, load-rate effects, aging, creep, shrinkage, crushing, confinement, concrete-reinforcement interaction, and high-temperature softening behavior. The combination of these features results in an exceptional representation of concrete intricate behavior. It also leads to more accurate results when compared to standard finite element “built-in” concrete material libraries, all the while being implemented within the same standard finite element formulation.

READ MORE

Oil and Gas Pipeline Intel - Industry Regulation Insights

News & Views, Volume 50 | Oil and Gas Pipeline Intel

/in , , /by

PRCI June Technical Committee MeetingsOil and Gas Pipeline Intel - Industry Regulation Insights

Structural Integrity Associates (SI) recently attended the PRCI June 2021 Technical Committee (TC) Meetings. SI is also planning to support the upcoming PRCI NDE workshop scheduled for October 2021 as well as future committee meetings. SI will continue to engage and support industry with PRCI.  As a researcher for PRCI, SI is pleased to support industry in the development and evaluation of new technology and methods that can enhance pipeline safety and reliability.  SI continues to support the development of new tools and analytical methods to help advance crack management, material verification, NDE inspections, and pipeline integrity management and share our experience with PRCI and industry.  Please contact us with any questions regarding our involvement or how SI can support your pipeline safety and reliability objectives.

SI Presenting at the 2021 AGA Operations Conference on “Responding to Cracks and Crack-Like Defects for Mega-Rule 1”.

Structural Integrity is pleased to partner with Duke Energy to present on Mega-Rule 1 requirements for the Analysis of Predicted Failure Pressure (192.712).  Procedures, tools and practical applications will be presented along with specific case studies.  In addition, methods to address additional requirements for evaluating cyclic fatigue will also be presented.  This presentation will be at the AGA Fall Operations Conference in Orlando, FL scheduled for October 6, 2021 at 10:45 AM in the Integrity Management track. Additional detail on the event can be found at the following site: www.aga.org/OpsConf2021