Tailored heat treatments to characterise the fracture resistance of critical weld regions in hydrogen transmission pipelines

TL;DR

This study develops a protocol for characterizing the fracture resistance of weld regions in hydrogen pipelines by tailoring heat treatments to replicate microstructures and testing their toughness in hydrogen environments.

Contribution

It introduces a novel heat treatment protocol to replicate HAZ microstructures for fracture testing in hydrogen pipelines, highlighting microstructure influence on embrittlement.

Findings

Reduced fracture resistance in HAZ microstructures

Higher hydrogen embrittlement susceptibility observed

Initiation toughness as low as 32 MPa√m

Abstract

A new protocol is presented to directly characterise the toughness of microstructural regions present within the weld heat-affected zone (HAZ), the most vulnerable location governing the structural integrity of hydrogen transport pipelines. Heat treatments are tailored to obtain bulk specimens that replicate predominantly ferritic-bainitic, bainitic, and martensitic microstructures present in the HAZ. These are applied to a range of pipeline steels to investigate the role of manufacturing era (vintage versus modern), chemical composition, and grade. The heat treatments successfully reproduce the hardness levels and microstructures observed in the HAZ of existing natural gas pipelines. Subsequently, fracture experiments are conducted in air and pure H2 at 100 bar, revealing a reduced fracture resistance and higher hydrogen embrittlement susceptibility of the HAZ microstructures, with initiation toughness values as low as 32 MPa$\sqrt{\text{m}}$. The findings emphasise the need to adequately consider the influence of microstructure and hard, brittle zones within the HAZ.