Hydrodynamic Aspects of Staggered Spoilers fitted Subsea Pipelines

Abstract

Subsea pipelines are affected with many surrounding challenges. One of these challenges is the current-induced hydrodynamic stresses which affect the pipeline throughout its life span. Therefore, several methods have been suggested to reduce these stresses and hence protect the pipe. The aim of this paper is to investigate the effect of one of the protection methods; that is fitting the pipe with staggered spoilers along its length using computational fluid dynamics. A computational model based on Navies-Stokes for a single phase flow was developed to simulate the flow around the pipeline. Five turbulence models are used in the numerical investigation and their results are validated against the experimental data of a fully exposed pipeline resting on a plane boundary under various flow conditions. Comparison between flow field characteristics around the pipe with and without spoilers are conducted and discussed.

Keywords

• submarine pipeline
• spoiler
• hydrodynamic forces
• turbulence models