New lifetime prediction techniques for buried polymer pipes

聚合物（即塑料）管道是加拿大市政地埋基础设施的重要组成部分，用于雨水和饮用水的应用。这些埋地结构的设计需要考虑土壤和聚合物结构，以及两者之间发展的土壤-结构相互作用。但是，它们能持续多久呢？目前，没有人能肯定地说。聚合物材料的预期使用寿命至少为75年，这通常是基于在理想条件下获得的有限数据或有根据的猜测。虽然这是合理的第一步，但加拿大的市政工程师和城市规划者还需要更多。聚合物水管的寿命是75年还是150年，对我们日益老龄化和不断发展的城市中心来说，会产生数十亿美元的影响。因此，“发现”研究项目的总体愿景是创造新的基础工程科学知识，培训15名高素质人才，并开发合理的预测技术，所有这些都是为了评估加拿大市政埋地基础设施的聚合物组件的使用寿命。***第一次，长期的土壤-结构相互作用将通过在高温下进行的全尺寸物理实验来模拟，在其埋藏构型的实际结构上进行，并且聚合物降解已经加速。这种高度原创的方法将使我们能够消除猜测，并最终确定故障机制，发生的时间，影响它的因素，以及可以做些什么来延长寿命。这将是加拿大市政当局和世界各地城市如何管理我们庞大而老化的下水道和供水管网的开创性进步。了解管道如何发生故障，并有工具预测新管道的使用寿命或现有管道的剩余寿命，这些都是管理计划的重要输入，工程师可以使用这些计划来延长这些公共资产的使用寿命，优化维修和更换投资。新的寿命预测技术也将被制造商和工程师用于研究特定类别的埋地结构。对控制使用寿命的潜在机制有了新的认识，可以开发几何结构的改进或材料的改进，以延长新建基础设施的使用寿命。制造商和用户将首次对使用寿命进行合理估计，取代指标值和判断。这将使公用事业公司能够更明智地选择产品，加拿大制造商能够更有效地开发和在国际上销售产品。*** Discovery研究项目还将为15名高素质人才（5名博士，5名MASc， 5名BASc）提供特殊的培训机会，这些人才具有岩土工程和土木工程顾问非常需要的地下基础设施专业知识。

Polymer (i.e. plastic) pipes are vital components of Canada's municipal buried infrastructure for stormwater and drinking water applications. Design of these buried structures requires consideration of both the soil and the polymer structure, as well as the soil-structure interactions that develop between the two. But, just how long will they last? Currently, no one can say with certainty. Polymer materials are used with the expectation that they will last at least 75 years', often based on limited data obtained under idealized conditions or educated guesses. While a reasonable first step, Canadian municipal engineers and city planners need more. Whether a polymer water pipe will last 75 or 150 years has billion-dollar ramifications for our ageing and growing urban centres. The overarching vision of this Discovery research program is therefore to create new fundamental engineering science knowledge, train 15 highly qualified personnel, and develop rational predictive techniques all to evaluate how long the polymer components of Canada's municipal buried infrastructure will last. *** For the first time, long-term soil-structure interactions will be simulated using full-scale physical experiments at elevated temperature, conducted on actual structures in their buried configurations, and where polymer degradation has been accelerated. This highly-original approach will allow us to remove the speculation and finally identify the failure mechanism, the time it occurs, factors affecting it, and what can be done to prolong lifetime. This would be a groundbreaking advancement in how Canadian municipalities, and cities world-wide, manage our vast and ageing sewer and water pipe networks. Knowing how pipes can fail and having tools to predict how long a new pipe will last, or the remaining life of an existing pipe, are essential inputs to management plans that engineers use to increase longevity of these public assets and optimize investments in repair and replacement. The new lifetime prediction techniques will also be used by manufacturers and engineers to investigate specific classes of buried structures. Equipped with new understanding of the underlying mechanisms controlling service life, geometry refinements or materials improvements can be developed to extend the service life of newly built infrastructure. Manufacturers and users will, for the first time, have rational estimates of service lives, replacing index values and judgement'. This will allow utilities to choose products more wisely, and Canadian manufacturers to develop and market products internationally more effectively. *** This Discovery research program will also provide exceptional training opportunities for 15 highly-qualified personnel (5 PhD, 5 MASc, 5 BASc) with buried infrastructure expertise that is in very high demand by geotechnical and civil engineering consultants.