A rule based fuzzy synthetic evaluation method for risk assessment in pipeline transport

Abstract

Integrity Management Program (IMP) for oil and gas pipeline system demands a robust risk assessment method, which needs fully utilize the expert knowledge on the empirical data and the ambiguous cause(s) - effect(s) failure mechanism and then keep a good balance between precision and practicality. A new method, Rule Based Fuzzy Synthetic Evaluation (RB-FSE) which combines Fuzzy Synthetic Evaluation (FSE) with Fuzzy Logic (FLo) is proposed in this paper. It is applied to the pipeline risk assessment for Third-Party Damage (TPD). The proposed method is compared with scoring-type method in a case study. Results indicate that the relative assessment values from RB-FSE model could better support risk-ranking and decision-making in the IMP.