HYDRA™
Intelligent
Pigging
Inspection
Technology
By Rich Roberts, Quest Integrity Group.
Rich Roberts
Rich Roberts is Vice President and
General Manager, Process Division at
Quest Integrity Group, a global leader
in the development
and delivery of
asset integrity
management and
asset reliability
solutions. Mr.
Roberts directs
operations,
engineering
activities and
refining, chemical
and nuclear
industry-targeted
strategic initiatives.
Mr. Roberts received his A.S. in NDE
from the University of Alaska and his
B.S. degree in Welding Technology from
Ohio State University.
New regulatory mandates relating to
the inspection of buried piping in nuclear
power plants is an important topic
throughout the industry. Most plants have
already risk-ranked their piping systems
and initiated inspection of both safety
and non-safety related piping systems.
Although indirect inspection approaches
are being applied in several cases, direct
inspections are required in order to
comply with the regulatory mandates.
There are approaching deadlines for
many nuclear plants.
HYDRA, an ultrasonic-based intel-
ligent pigging inspection technology de-
veloped by Quest
Integrity Group, is
considered a direct
technology, thus it
complies with regu-
latory requirements.
HYDRA provides
a
comprehensive
inspection solution
for piping systems
buried below grade
or encased within
concrete, which are
otherwise inacces-
sible for external NDT/NDE inspection.
In 2011, Quest Integrity began
working closely with EPRI in an effort to
assessHYDRAand its applicabilitywithin
the nuclear industry. A formal technology
assessment report summarizing the test
results was generated by EPRI and is
available to member companies. In
parallel with the technology evaluation,
Quest Integrity has been working
closely with several utility companies
with immediate inspection needs.
Piping ranging from 3" - 24" (76mm
- 609mm) diameter is the immediate
focus; however larger piping diameters
are also under consideration. A few of
the piping systems being considered for
direct inspection utilizing HYDRA are
diesel fuel lines, reactor make-up lines,
condensate piping circuits, sump/drain
lines, etc. The current piping systems
contain a variety of materials such as
carbon steel and stainless steel.
In order to detect the anticipated
damage mechanisms in nuclear piping,
HYDRA provides 100% inspection
coverage of the interior and exterior
piping surfaces (see Figure 1). The tool
contains between 48 and 366 discrete
ultrasonic sensors, ensuring high-
resolution test results. HYDRA travels
through piping at speeds of two ft/second
(0.609 m/second.), while providing
100% inspection coverage. Many nuclear
facility piping systems have limited
internal access points, thus requiring bi-
directional travel from the inspection tool.
A bi-directional tool can be launched and
retrieved at the same point, eliminating
Figure 1 - HYDRA provides 100% inspection coverage of the interior and
exterior piping surfaces –including metal loss and wall thickness data.
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NuclearPlantJournal.com Nuclear Plant Journal, September-October 2013
