| ABSTRACT: | MODELING OF NDE RELIABILITY; DEVELOPMENT OF A POD-GENERATOR
AWF Volker, (TNO, TPD) F.H. Dijkstra (RTD), J.H.A.M. Heerings (TNO Industrie) and S. Terpstra (Shell
Global Solutions)
NDE in an in-service situation is used as a basis for integrity management as well as planning of future
inspection and maintenance actions. In such an environment it is of paramount importance that the
performance level of the NDT technique(s) used in terms of Probability Of Detection (POD) is known. It is
widely acknowledged that there is no such thing as “THE POD” of an NDE technique. This is because the
POD does not only depend on the physics of the NDE method and the procedure used, but also on factors
such as the degradation mechanism, the geometry of the component, accessibility, presence of coating or
insulation, density of sampling and personnel qualification and experience.
A number of industries in The Netherlands, among which chemical plant and pipeline owners as well as
NDE service companies have initiated a Joint Industry Project to develop a model and corresponding
software tool (ÔPOD-Generator’) to assess the inspection effectiveness in a specific situation. TNO
(institute of technology) is leading the project, which has been launched in October 2003 and will take 3
years.
The focus in the project is on the inspection of pipelines and piping, newly developed and conventional
NDE techniques as well as a number of specific degradation mechanisms. The paper will deal with the
concept of the POD Generator and results of the project gained so far.
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