LIMITS OF LINEPIPE WELD HARDNESS FOR DOMAINS OF SOUR SERVICE IN OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION

摘要

Weldment properties and service performance underpin the integrity of production facilities. Inparticular, the achievement of acceptable properties is essential in designing sour service systems wherehardness restrictions are employed to achieve resistance to sulphide stress cracking (SSC).This paper presents the outcome of an extensive systematic study to establish weld hardness limitsfor the domain of sour service. The project covered five categories of linepipe steels within API gradesX52 to X80 by evaluating the performance of thermally simulated and actual welds in a wide range ofenvironmental conditions. The outcome has extended the application domains of sour service for weldsenabling a greater degree of flexibility in sour service conditions and a major departure from therestrictions of NACE MR0175, i.e. 22 HRC.