About the structure of the system of physical protection of main pipelines against intended threats

• Main Authors: Vladimir A. Komarov, Zinaida V. Semenova, Dmitrii A. Bronnikov Omsk State Transport, Aleksei A. Nigrei
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Perm National Research Polytechnic University 2019-03-01
• Series: Perm Journal of Petroleum and Mining Engineering
• Subjects: main pipelines; unauthorized tie-ins; pumped product; emergency situations; methods for detecting and preventing product leaks; distributed fiber-optic systems; fighting artificial interference; multi-sensor system
• Online Access: http://vestnik.pstu.ru/get/_res/fs/file.pdf/8270/About+the+structure+of+the+system+of+physical+protection+of+main+pipelines+against+intended+threatsfile.pdf

The statistics of emergency situations at pipeline transportation facilities indicates the presence of problematic issues during transportation of products. In the structure of accidents of the past decade, theft of products (“mortise terrorism”) prevailed, sabotage acts were recorded. The article presents data about the growth in the number of criminal interventions in the operation of pipelines, which pose a great danger to the health and life of the population, a threat to the environment, as they cause accidents, spills of oil and oil products, pollution of soil, rivers and water bodies, as well as associated environmental and economic losses from these criminal interventions. The total losses incurred by the owner of the pipeline system from the attacks of intruders are illustrated. The less the owner invests in ensuring the safety of the infrastructure, the greater losses should be expected during the operations. The analysis of publication activity in the field of ensuring pipeline safety and the detection of unauthorized actions in the protection zone was carried out, which showed that the research is mainly focused on creating a system of physical protection of pipelines that implements the principle of “do not miss the attacker’s contact with the shell of the pipe”. The main direction of research to counter these threats is focused on the detection of the seismic field disturbances in the security zone of the pipeline using a fiber-optic cable (sensor). In addition to distributed fiber optic systems for the preventive neutralization of terrorist threats to extended objects, the capabilities of video-analytical and thermal imaging systems were evaluated. The structure of the pipelines physical protection system for the detection and neutralization of unauthorized tie-ins into the pipe in order to minimize the level of losses during pipeline security is proposed. The effectiveness of the proposed approach to determining the requirements for systems to protect objects from terrorist threats is demonstrated.