Reliability Analysis of Buried Flexible Pipe-Soil Systems

Abstract

Reliability analysis of the buried flexible pipe-soil system is performed from three different failure criteria: (1) deflection; (2) buckling; and (3) wall thrust. The response surface methodology is used to establish approximate functional relationships between input variables and output responses and reliability analysis is performed using first-order reliability method approach. The available analytical solutions as well as the results of the numerical analysis are used in the reliability analysis and results are discussed. A comparison of results of the reliability analysis of the buried pipe-soil system in the light of available deterministic solutions indicated that the probabilistic approach, which considers variability in the input parameters provides a means of understanding of the performance of the buried pipe-soil system.