Inspection of Buried or Inaccessable Piping in Nuclear Power Plants Utilizing Ultrasonic Based Intelligent Pigging Technology

Buried or inaccessible piping systems within Nuclear Power plants present a challenge in terms of overall inspection. Limited access and complex piping configurations restrict the type of indirect or direct NDE methodologies which can be applied by inspectors. Due to the complexity of buried and above-grade piping systems routed in and around these facilities, many plants have been forced to look outside of the nuclear industry to determine if other industries such as refinery, gas, oil and pipeline owner/operators have existing NDE technologies which can be applied to the nuclear industry. For several decades, many industries have applied intelligent pigging technology to inspect pipelines ranging from 4” to 52” diameter. Due to an aging infrastructure and numerous highly publicized failures with loss of containment within various refining and petrochemical complexes, these facilities were forced to push the envelope in terms of advancing the intelligent pigging inspection approach so it could be applied within piping systems previously classified as “unpiggable or difficult to inspect.” Similar to the challenges the nuclear industry faces today, the refining and petrochemical industries have hundreds of miles of buried or inaccessible piping within their facilities which have gone uninspected since original construction.