THE INS AND OUTS OF PIPELINE CLEANERS:TESTING AND EVALUATION FOR CHEMICAL CLEANERS

摘要

The numerous reasons for cleaning a transmission pipeline include increasingefficiency, preventing corrosion, increasing operational safety, complying withgovernmental regulations, and changing pipeline operations. As part of the pipelinecleaning procedure, a chemical cleaning agent is typically used to aid in the removal ofvarious line deposits. With an emphasis on solids characterization, a series of six criteriabased upon lab performance using line deposits have been designed to select the bestcleaner in a particular application. Combining operational parameters and physicalanalysis of the line deposits, the choice between an oil soluble and a water solublechemical treatment is based upon efficacy and operational considerations. The testingcriteria then require the optimal agent to be dispersible in the solvent of choice, penetratesolids deposited on the pipeline walls, suspend the line deposits within the cleaningsolution, retain solution flowability even with suspended solids, and settle for easierdisposal. Each of the above criteria strongly correlate with desired field performance asdemonstrated in several applications. Whether a particular deposit is black powder or asolid scale, the use of reasoned parametric design provides for a more efficient and costeffective chemical cleaning solution.