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Certificate Course
on

PIPIN G ENGINEERING
December? - 21, 2005

INTRODUCTION
Prof. A. S. Moharir
IIT Bombay
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Organized by

Cell
Piping Engineering

Computer Aided Design Centre

Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay
Powai, Mumbai 400 076

PIPING ENGINEERING CELL

INTRODUCTION
About two decades ago, in India, the
design procedure for piping systems for
Refineries, Petrochemicals and Fertihzer
in magnitude,
Plants,
depth and
complexities were not fully evolved. Only
in the recent past, we were exposed in
detail to this field. Now we are selfsufficient in the field of piping technology
and design.
Piping systems in a chemical plant are
comparable to the vanes and arteries
through which fluids, vapors, slurries,
solids, etc. flow under various conditions,
as imposed by the process design of the
plant. Piping network is subjected to
ahnost all the severest conditions of the
plant such as high temperature, 'pressure,
flow
and combination of these. In
addition to the above, corrosion, erosion,
toxic conditions and radioactivity add to
more problems and difficulties in piping
design. With the process conditions
becoming more and more severe by the
advancement in process development, a
continuous effort is required to be carried
on simultaneously to cope up with the
demands of process. This makes the job of
a piping engineer more complex and
responsible.
Piping, because of its nature, requires a
number of day to day decisions on matter s
of detail, v/hich, in some ways are often
more difficult to solve than major issues
connected with the project. It is this same
detail which can cause expensive delays in
design and construction and consequently
in commissioning. All too often in the
past, piping has been regarded as an
unimportant job in the overall project
engineering instead of being treated as a
ftinction requiring as wide a knowledge,
experience and variety skills as any other
branch of engineering.

In ahnost all chemical industries, the

installed capital cost of piping is a major
factor in plant investment. Figs. 1 and
2 show a chart based on oil refineries,
chemical and petrochemical complexes.
Fig. 1 shows that, excluding major
equipment costs, piping is the largest plant
cost component. It exceeds the next
largest component by a factor of two. It is
also observed firom Fig. 3 that piping
exceeds all other field costs by a
substantial amount.
Fig. 2 indicates that
utilizes
design engineering
approximately
45% of engineering man-hours and 50%
of these hours are used in piping design.
In addition to the above, the lost time in
piping has an effect, which goes well
beyond' its direct cost, as it involves
financial loss in some proportion to the
total plant investment. The delay in and
diuing start up means idle capital and
losses in plant earning capacity.
In the recent years, the trend is to develop
better techniques so as to save time in
piping activities. Computer is being used
extensively to obtain rapid solutions to the
more complex problems of plant design
and, in so for as piping is concerned, to
the solving of problems of pipe stressing.
More recently, it is being employed
for production of piping detail drawings,
piping isom_ettics, bill of materials, cost
estimation and control. Piping engineer
has therefore a fiirther responsibility in
understanding and application of
continually growing techniques of this
nature.