From Subsea to Life On Land

Gasket Technology Follows Darwinism

TVEDESTRAND, Norway, Aug. 23, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Metal-to-metal sealing technology is a technique that had previously been reserved for subsea oil and gas applications where meeting the most extreme operational criteria has always been required. Such criteria demand that any equipment, tools, and sealing technology must withstand extreme crushing depths where environmental pressures and temperatures will easily destroy any object that falls victim to their reach. However, now this revolutionary technology has made landfall and is changing the landscape of onshore operations. It has quickly begun presenting the opportunity to help resolve serious challenges such as, fugitive emission, as well as significantly reducing risk factors, and improving the bottom line of business.

The company responsible for bringing this technological evolution to land is the Norwegian based company Pipeotech AS. Adapted directly from the same subsea technology, the DeltaV-Seal offers manufacturers and production facilities alike significant enhancements in operations across a wider spectrum of function than competing spiral-wound or kammprofile gasket technologies. Difficulties associated with these older sealing technologies motivated Pipeotech engineers to take up the challenge of developing a new technology that would replace them. Some of the primary goals were to develop a gasket that would last significantly longer, exceed a gas-tight strength, and eliminate the need for maintenance. All three of these contribute to significant reductions in ecological harm, employee risk, and operating expenditures.

Typically, a gasket fails to capture much attention, because it is thought of as a small detail from a macro perspective in piping infrastructure design. Serving as a meeting point between two pipes, flanges are identified as a risk in the construction or update of any production facility. However, through the usage of spiral-wound and kammeprofile technologies, most production facilities currently anticipate or accept certain levels of leakage as normal. This approach often has gaskets being treated as a consumable. Both of these technologies offer similar lifespans and an equal amount of required maintenance while in operation. As a result, gaskets are selected as a last detail for the final facility design, with the overall emphasis being placed on gasket cost. The most effective gasket sealing technology plays a much larger role in daily operations beyond containing leaks. When either of these sealing technologies are utilized, a true gas-tight seal is never truly obtained. This leads to the possibility of leakage points which being created, posing various risks such as;