Energy Infrastructure Safety Under Thermal And Mechanical Loads

Chi, Kaiyi

Energy Infrastructure Safety Under Thermal And Mechanical Loads

Chi, Kaiyi

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Publication Type:: Thesis
Issue Date:: 2025

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Field	Value	Language
dc.contributor.author	Chi, Kaiyi
dc.date.accessioned	2025-11-10T00:03:58Z
dc.date.available	2025-11-10T00:03:58Z
dc.date.issued	2025
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/10453/190637
dc.description	University of Technology Sydney. Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology.	en_US.UTF-8
dc.description.abstract	Natural gas pipelines and liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage tank are important components in energy sector. The investment and construction of gas pipelines and LNG storage tanks are developing rapidly. Understanding their response to the service and accidental loading condition is critical to the energy safety. Pipelines convey a wide range of liquid and gas over long distances, essential for urban functionality. Shallow-buried pipelines, due to their accessibility, are vulnerable to accidental or intentional damage. In Australia, AS/NZS 2885 provides regulations to prevent damage to the pipelines by external interference, but these regulations are vague and there is a limit study in relation to the performance of pipelines against surface explosion and accidental excavator impact. Meanwhile, the inner structure of All Concrete LNG (ACLNG) storage tanks is in direct contact with LNG (at approximately -161.5 °C). Meanwhile, during the operation, the inner tank materials may also suffer from cryogenic freeze-thaw (FT) cycle attacks. As a storing system, ACLNG tanks potentially face threats of vehicle impact and/or terrorist attacks. This research focuses on the safety of energy infrastructure including the gas pipeline and ACLNG storage tank. The dynamic behaviour of concrete with respect to compression and splitting tension at cryogenic temperature and after FT cycles is investigated. To improve the impact/blast resistant capabilities of ACLNG storage tank, a comprehensive experimental and numerical investigation was conducted on emerging high performance concrete material, i.e., cement-based ultra-high performance concrete (CUHPC) and sustainable material geopolymer ultra-high performance concrete (GUHPC). The research covered detailed dynamic mechanical characterisation of these advanced cementitious materials, followed by implementation in numerical models simulating structural responses of ACLNG storage tank under extreme loading conditions. This study adopts advanced fully coupled numerical modelling approaches such as FSI (fluid-structure interaction coupling) and ALE (arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian) in commercial software LS-DYNA to analyse buried pipeline responses to blast loading. It examines key factors such as soil type, burial depth, pipe thickness, diameter, charge weight, explosive offset, detonation height, steel grade and internal pressure. The simulation results serve as theoretical foundation for gas pipelines safety assessment and maintenance. Furthermore, the findings of this study provide new information for the dynamic behaviour of conventional and high performance concrete material (CUHPC and GUHPC) at cryogenic temperature and after FT cycles as well as energy infrastructure (ACLNG and gas pipeline) response under blast and impact loads, and will promote their application in civil engineering projects going forwards.	en_US.UTF-8
dc.format	Thesis (PhD)
dc.language.iso	en_US	en_US.UTF-8
dc.relation	https://opus.lib.uts.edu.au/bitstream/10453/190637/1/thesis.pdf
dc.rights	info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
dc.rights	The author owns the copyright in this thesis including all reproduction and reuse rights for the work. The work may not be altered without the permission of the copyright owner. Attribution is essential when quoting or paraphrasing from this thesis.
dc.rights	© 2025 Kaiyi Chi
dc.rights	au.edu.uts.lib/cph
dc.title	Energy Infrastructure Safety Under Thermal And Mechanical Loads	en_US.UTF-8
dc.type	Thesis
utslib.copyright.status	open_access	*

Abstract:

Natural gas pipelines and liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage tank are important components in energy sector. The investment and construction of gas pipelines and LNG storage tanks are developing rapidly. Understanding their response to the service and accidental loading condition is critical to the energy safety. Pipelines convey a wide range of liquid and gas over long distances, essential for urban functionality. Shallow-buried pipelines, due to their accessibility, are vulnerable to accidental or intentional damage. In Australia, AS/NZS 2885 provides regulations to prevent damage to the pipelines by external interference, but these regulations are vague and there is a limit study in relation to the performance of pipelines against surface explosion and accidental excavator impact. Meanwhile, the inner structure of All Concrete LNG (ACLNG) storage tanks is in direct contact with LNG (at approximately -161.5 °C). Meanwhile, during the operation, the inner tank materials may also suffer from cryogenic freeze-thaw (FT) cycle attacks. As a storing system, ACLNG tanks potentially face threats of vehicle impact and/or terrorist attacks. This research focuses on the safety of energy infrastructure including the gas pipeline and ACLNG storage tank. The dynamic behaviour of concrete with respect to compression and splitting tension at cryogenic temperature and after FT cycles is investigated. To improve the impact/blast resistant capabilities of ACLNG storage tank, a comprehensive experimental and numerical investigation was conducted on emerging high performance concrete material, i.e., cement-based ultra-high performance concrete (CUHPC) and sustainable material geopolymer ultra-high performance concrete (GUHPC). The research covered detailed dynamic mechanical characterisation of these advanced cementitious materials, followed by implementation in numerical models simulating structural responses of ACLNG storage tank under extreme loading conditions. This study adopts advanced fully coupled numerical modelling approaches such as FSI (fluid-structure interaction coupling) and ALE (arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian) in commercial software LS-DYNA to analyse buried pipeline responses to blast loading. It examines key factors such as soil type, burial depth, pipe thickness, diameter, charge weight, explosive offset, detonation height, steel grade and internal pressure. The simulation results serve as theoretical foundation for gas pipelines safety assessment and maintenance. Furthermore, the findings of this study provide new information for the dynamic behaviour of conventional and high performance concrete material (CUHPC and GUHPC) at cryogenic temperature and after FT cycles as well as energy infrastructure (ACLNG and gas pipeline) response under blast and impact loads, and will promote their application in civil engineering projects going forwards.

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