Effect of Wave Impeding Barrier Depth on Buried Pipeline

Pipelines are one of most important component of lifeline engineering. For instance, the Southern Caucasus- Eastern Turkey energy corridors are formed by several key pipelines carrying crude oil and natural gas from Azerbaijan, via Georgia, to world markets through Mediterranean Sea. Many project accomplished recently and construction of new corridors are still going on. They should be protected from earthquake disaster especially when they pass through high seismicity zones. The wave impeding barrier (WIB) based on the cut-off frequency of a soil layer over bedrock can be used to reduce the earthquake excitation of this vulnerable the infrastructures. In this paper, efficiency of WIB with the application of various depths underneath of pipeline is investigated. The proposed model is analyzed as numerical simulation using 2D finite element analysis. A parametric study carried out for various depths of embankment of WIB. The soil is defined as semi-infinite medium by using absorbent boundaries and Mohr-Coulomb material model is chosen in the analysis. Results showed that artificial bedrock can be very promising as an isolator to protect pipelines when they buried for a certain depth.