Vibration and ground rupture criteria for buried pipelines
This paper describes the process of developing blasting specifications for 850 miles of new pipe trench running parallel to an existing high-pressure gas pipeline, often with as little as 14 ft to the existing pipeline trench. The primary method of preventing damage to the existing pipeline was the use of fracture (overbreak) control. The residential type ground vibration limits which had been first proposed for the project would have eliminated blasting through most of the project route, and it would not have been physically or economically feasible to do the work mechanically. If the limit were raised to a value in the range of 5--6 ips, the work would have become technically possible if limited to a volume of a few cubic yards on a building lot, but not feasible over a project length of many hundreds of miles. Neither of these vibration limits, nor the concept of vibration limits alone, was considered to be appropriate for the specifications for this project. Economic feasibility has to be considered as seriously as technical feasibility to make a project viable. For demonstration purposes in the present case, a buried test pipe was subjected to controlled blasting tests at distances from 7.5 ft to 20 ft from the existing pipe, using various quantities of explosives, while vibrations and strains were monitored. Although the rock between trenches was blown away, and ground particle velocity was about 63 ips, no damage was done to the test pipe.
- OSTI ID:
- 433688
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-940144-; TRN: IM9709%%121
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 20. annual Society of Explosives Engineers meeting on explosives and blasting techniques, Austin, TX (United States), 30 Jan - 4 Feb 1994; Other Information: PBD: 1994; Related Information: Is Part Of Proceedings of the twentieth annual conference on explosives and blasting technique; PB: 593 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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