Analysis of Stresses on Buried Pipeline Subjected to Landslide Based on Numerical Simulation and Regression Analysis

The integrity of oil and gas pipelines is seriously impacted by landslides in tough terrain in western China. The quantitative assessment technology is an effective method for pipelines risk management under threat of geohazard. In order to establish the vulnerability assessment indexes system of pipelines subjected to landslides, the numerical simulation based on the finite element method is adopted to study the pipeline axial stresses. There are five kinds of calculation schemes considered by changing the geometrical sizes and inclination angles of landslide, the pipeline length passing through landslide and buried depth of pipeline, and the axial stresses and bending moments of pipeline can be obtained by means of numerical simulation for different calculation conditions under the every kind of scheme. In the study, regression analysis method is used to derive the axial stress equation of pipeline from calculation results of numerical simulation by taking into consideration the above five indexes. The feasibility and practicality of this equation are verified by the given example of a pipeline passing through a certain landslide in southwest China. The comparison analysis between the monitoring data and calculation results shows that the calculation values agree well with the monitoring data of pipeline axial stresses.