SFL Times July 2018 by Seal For Life

Securing a water supply The Eleven Cities Race The contractor’s in Mumbai 9 for Waterfront Brigade 14 delight

eNt Albania US$2; Australia A$6.50 (inc GST); Bulgaria BGL5.90; Canada C$4.95 (Toronto C$4.75); Croatia KN24; Cyprus E3.00 C£1.76; Czech Rep. CK91; Denmark DK28; Estonia K30: Gibraltar G£0,80; Hungary F650; Kenya KSH185; Latvia LVL 2.75; Malta E2.70; Morocco D25; Norway NK35; Poland Zl12.00; Romania E3.40; Russia US$2.75; Slovakia E3.00/Sk90.38; Sweden SK35; Switzerland SF6.20; Thailand B190; Turkey YTL 5.00; Ukraine US$3.50; USA US$3.75

Quarterly edition Summer 2018

2014 Liquid Pipeline Coating Technology

Offshore Solutions

esse idem

caest iam

au‑

esse idem

caest iam

au‑

Renewable energy

New chances for the pipeline and offshore industry esse caest au‑ idem he north of the Netherlands is whose iam maximum strength has until now Seal For Life Industries is already involved

an interesting but small part of our large earth. It’s a region where revolutionary things are happening in the field of energy transition and renewable energy. Not entirely coincidentally, the Energy Delta Institute was set up there more than twenty years ago in Groningen. The region has since become known as the European Energy Valley and the United Nations Climate Institute is going to move into premises there soon.

remained under 3.6 on the Richter scale. This latest development has particularly contributed to the fact that even more urgency, knowledge and expertise is being put into developing sustainable energy. Hydrogen energy is an important spearhead of this, although a new phenomenon known as ‘blue energy’ is now also attracting international attention.

esse idem Largest gas field in Europe Meanwhile, the area has become home to a successful cluster of companies, research institutes and organizations involved in energy transition and renewable energy. All of this, directly or indirectly, has to do with the location, which is above the largest gas field in Europe. However, even way back in the 1980s, people already realised that gas supplies – however large – are not inexhaustible.

esse idem Plagued by earthquakes Over the past few years, the area above the gas field has been plagued by earthquakes

in building and maintaining windmill parks in this area. What’s more, tasks such as protecting anything from cables and pipelines to whole infrastructures are part of the potential scope of companies that focus on preserving pipelines and all sorts of other objects (e.g. by coating or sealing them). Read more on page 4

caest iam

Cedric Ballay Vice President SFL Industries

au‑

“We offer the highest levels of technical expertise and field support.” Seal For Life Industries is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Berry Global, Inc. Our product portfolio includes a number of leading brands for corrosion protection and prevention. Headquartered in Stadskanaal, in The Netherlands, SFL Industries operates worldwide through a number of manufacturing facilities and sales offices. This enables us to be close to our partners and customers, and to offer the highest levels of technical expertise and field support. Read more on page 2

au‑

Summer 2018

A knowledgeable and winning team

Cedric Ballay: “We have been restless in our innovations.”

hen I’m at home with my family, I’m amazed at the speed at which technology develops, and how my children adapt to the seemingly endless possibilities of a new gadget or toy. At work, technology-change seems to move even faster. Throughout my career in Specialty materials, I have witnessed many evolutions and innovations. The pace never slackens: the demand for newer, more powerful, safer and more environmentally-friendly solutions has only become more intense. As worldwide populations have grown and we have become more globalized, demands on electrical and water infrastructure and the need for longer-term solutions have become paramount. This has

mission is Always Advancing To Protect What’s Important. When I joined SFL recently, I could see that my colleagues already live by that motto. I was immediately impressed by the breadth of the SFL portfolio and its truly global reach: we are a very special business. The mix of strong established brands and gamechanging technology provide the perfect platform for new and enhanced solutions and opportunities for future growth. And of course, I was incredibly excited to see our Stadskanaal Experience Center, which showcases the tremendous strength of our solutions all under one roof.

necessitated transformation, not only in infrastructure solutions, but also in the business models of the companies that provide them. Rapid change has never been far from our minds at Seal For Life. We see it both as a challenge and an opportunity. Throughout our history, we have demonstrated the ability to be agile; to develop skills and set standards in new fields of corrosion protection and prevention, and also to provide products that work for the longterm in some of the harshest environments known to man. Supportive ownership As you will read in the pages of this magazine, we have been restless in our recent innovations. SFL Industries is owned by Berry Global, Inc. and our group company

I’d like to invite all of our partners and customers to see this for themselves.

Cedric Ballay Vice President SFL Industries

“An internal restructure has given us more focus, wider capabilities and reinforced our commitment.”

Stopaq B.V. Gasselterstraat 20 9503 JB Stadskanaal The Nederlands Tel: +31 59 969 6170 info@stopaq.nl

Powerful brands and new markets Another thing that impressed me was the way in which SFL has diversified its offer, so that we can now deliver superb solutions – coupled with specification support – for a wider range of applications

including oil & gas, water, infrastructure and renewable energy. The power of brands such as STOPAQ®, Covalence®, Polyken®, Powercrete® and Anodeflex™ has been unleashed across a much wider geographic and application area – very exciting for our 260 employees.

Cedric Ballay VICE PRESIDENT

Neil Gill Sales Director EMEA

Abhishek Kapur Sales Manager India

José Reynoso Technical Service South America

Robert van Klei Sales Director

Adelaide Cappa Sales Manager Southern Europe

KB Singh Spec Service India

Rahul Dabas Sales Manager India

Frederique Bontje PR & Marketing

Elmar Chavet Sales Manager Nothern Europe

Inge Robyns Customer Service

Hans Goethuys Technical Service Engineer

Seal For Life has hundreds of personnel worldwide but a ‘one team’ approach. We are driven by collaboration, passion, the sharing of ideas and the pursuit of excellence. Every voice is heard, and every individual effort contributes to the whole.

Moving forward together Aside from the exciting developments in our product portfolio, we have also made many more changes ‘behind the scenes’. An internal restructure has given us more focus, wider capabilities and reinforced our commitment to providing the best prevention and protection solutions as one supplier. The team has always been highly-technically capable and committed to delivering results for the business and our customers, now we are in a better place to do just that. I hope you enjoy the stories within these pages, and can see how we are developing a business that supports our customers and end-users for the long-term. Our ambitions are weighted in solid industry understanding, a motivated team and highly-specialized solutions. New challenges herald new possibilities and great opportunities. We look forward to working with you on some of those in the near future.

Stopaq endeavors to optimally guarantee the rights of creators and performers of works shown or mentioned in this publication. Stopaq has therefore, insofar as reasonably possible, assured itself that this showing or reporting does not infringe the rights of third parties. However, the nature of the material implies that in some cases the identity or whereabouts of the rightful claimants cannot reasonably be ascertained. If any (legal) person believes that he can assert rights on the content of Investors Times, please contact Stopaq. Stopaq has the copyright to the photos published on this site. No part of this publication may be copied or used, unless Stopaq and any third party entitled parties have obtained this explicitly.

Bob Buchanan Sales Director Americas

Riyad Alhasan Sales Manager Middle East

Erik Smid Customer Service

Simon Kwan Technical Service Engineer

Francis Maxwell Western Region Sales Manager

Katrien Masschelein Covalence® Product Manager

Leticia Pelayo Customer Service

Kesava Kumar Dudi Technical Service Engineer

Scott Smith Eastern Region Sales Manager

Ahmed Moinuddin Spec Service Pakistan & Middle East

Cor Prins Global Technical Director

Desraj Verma Technical Service Engineer

Carl Gudme Sales Manager South & Latin America

Frank Muffels Sales Director India & Asia

Jack Burns Technical Service Americas

Bas Huizing Technical Service Engineer

Summer 2018

Energy transition: Holland is leading DID YOU KNOW?

WHAT IS THE AFSLUITDIJK?

There is a scientific hotspot called EnTranCe with the facilities, technology and best possible network to develop ways to exceed energy market demands by using new energy products and services. It is a field lab where researchers and students join forces with businesses, entrepreneurs, civil society, policymakers and the general public to build our future sustainable society. EnTranCe offers an inspirational setting, stateof-the-art facilities and technical support for product research, development and testing. These facilities include an interconnected energy bridge where projects can be tested as part of an integrated system.

The Eemshaven region in the province of Groningen will have an excess of electricity in the future, once all the planned offshore wind farms are built. “It is reasonable to conclude that Eemshaven will develop into a green electricity hub where between 6,000 and 8,000 MWe of green electricity will be available. A small portion can be absorbed by data centers, but there is potential for at least 1,000 MWe in green electricity available for green hydrogen production via electrolysis. Expansion of the grid capacity to 5,610 MWe is scheduled to occur in phases. Even if the capacity increases, green electricity production will still exceed it in periods of full wind power availability. The need for hydrogen (or green hydrogen) in the chemical industry and the current limited nature of the grid are equally important arguments for building additional electrolysis capacity.”

t the moment, there are ambitious new plans to create a ‘hydrogen economy’. These are being initiated by the northern provinces of the Netherlands – which is where the country’s natural gas is currently being produced. Years of earthquakes in the province of Groningen, which is home to the largest gas field of Europe, have necessitated a gradual phase-out of gas production. The Dutch want to build 4 GW of offshore wind capacity in the North Sea (at a cost of €12 to €15 billion) and convert part of the wind power into hydrogen (the hydrogenrelated projects would cost between €5.5 and €10 billion). There are four markets that could make use of hydrogen: The first is the chemical industry. With green hydrogen, the chemical industry can decarbonize its chemical products and thereby contribute to the greenhouse gas emissions reduction that was agreed upon in Paris. As one of the first large-scale users, the Nuon Magnum power plant could absorb large volumes of green or carbon-free hydrogen. The second market now enters the picture:

hydrogen fuel-cell buses, trucks, trains, boats and cars can be developed. Car manufacturers are introducing the first hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles to the market, but scaling up the production and sales of these cars will only be possible if infrastructure for hydrogen fueling stations exists. Meanwhile, various councils in the northern provinces of the Netherlands already have hydrogenpowered company cars: an aspect that has attracted interest from all around the world. The region seems to have taken a lead in this respect. The third market for green hydrogen is the ‘electricity balancing’ market. Green hydrogen could be used to produce electricity

with fuel cells, gas turbines or flexible

combined-cycle power plants for periods when there is insufficient electricity from wind and solar power – for example, at data centers that want to run entirely on green electricity. They can buy electricity from a wind farm, but for periods when there is insufficient wind electricity, electricity could be supplied by green hydrogen fuel cells, gas turbines or flexible combined-cycle power plants. A fourth market for green hydrogen would be for heating homes and buildings. Green hydrogen could (possibly) be distributed via retrofitted gas distribution pipelines. By simply changing the burners in the boilers, it will be possible to burn hydrogen instead of natural gas.

The Afsluitdijk is a major causeway in the Netherlands, constructed between 1927 and 1932 and running from Den Oever on Wieringen in North Holland province, to the village of Zurich in the Friesland province, over a length of 32 kilometres (20 mi) and a width of 90 metres (300 ft), at an initial height of 7.25 metres (23.8 ft) above sea level. It is a fundamental part of the larger Zuiderzee Works, damming off the Zuiderzee, a salt water inlet of the North Sea, and turning it into the fresh water lake of the IJsselmeer.

Blue Energy initiatives focus on developing a sustainable technology for electricity generation by using the salinity gradient between river water and seawater. This would combine electrochemistry, polymer chemistry, process engineering and water pretreatment technology to generate renewable electrical energy. New investigations are directed towards antifouling measures and the development of membranes that are not susceptible to fouling. Blue Energy solutions under development include a Blue Battery that uses a reversible bipolar membrane for the storage of electrical energy in acids and bases while the chemical energy is turned into electrical energy during discharge. Blue energy is generated by a chemical

the Afsluitdijk – a National Heritage site – which has the fresh water of the Ijsselmeer lake on one side, and the salty Wadden Sea on the other. The pilot plant that has been installed there must provide energy to 1250 households in 2020. The ultimate goal has also been set out: a fully equipped energy plant with enough capacity to serve half a million households. By using the technology to serve numerous places within the Netherlands (and of course also in the rest of the world), the expectation is that it will be able to accommodate a huge proportion of energy consumption requirements. Within the Netherlands, it is expected that blue energy will – within a relatively short time – be able to supply the energy needs of the three northernmost provinces. With a good, global approach, estimates show that over 80% of energy could be generated by blue energy.

It’s worth noting that the Dutch electricity company TenneT, which is also the largest system operator in Germany, has a plan to build an artificial island in the North Sea between the Netherlands and the UK to serve as a hub for offshore wind production. From this energy island, offshore wind would be distributed to the German, Dutch, UK, Belgian, Norwegian and Danish electricity markets.

The Dutch government will strengthen the Afsluitdijk in the coming years to safeguard its future and to continue to protect the Netherlands against the force of water, its renovation will start in 2018.

process by which fresh river water is brought into contact with salty seawater. The Netherlands is extremely suitable for generating blue energy because there are lots of locations where fresh water and salt water come together. A good example of this is at

There is still a certain time to go before the Blue Energy & hydrogen dreams of the Dutch northern provinces will become a reality. The roadmap will have to be implemented through a collaborative, well coordinated and tightly directed effort by companies, governments and educational institutions. There are therefore quite considerable safety and other challenges

The Energy Valley Foundation focuses on expanding the energy sector in the northern part of The Netherlands. This is being done by creating the right preconditions and accelerating new knowledge and other projects through close collaboration between the public and private sectors. The foundation’s focus is on the following SWITCH themes: Gas in Transition, Energy System 2.0, and Offshore Energy.

involved in using existing gas pipelines and storage facilities for hydrogen. For the Netherlands however, one thing is clear, though: the Dutch will lose their position as a gas-producing and exporting country in the coming years. Not only will gas production in Groningen be phased out, but the government has also announced that there is “no future” for shale gas production. On the other hand, new possibilities and new innovations will come quicker than we can imagine at this moment. Renewable energy, in whichever form, will offer new possibilities and challenges to everyone in this professional field. The innovative power of Seal For Life Industries will in any case prove its worth more and more often over the next few years in this small part of the world alone.

Summer 2018

Spring 2014

total care

Summer 2018

Spring 2014

everywhere, anywhere

why anodeflex The Anodeflex™ system offers a better, more cost effective, and environmental friendly approach to pipe rehabilitation. It is typically installed in the same right of way as the pipe, adjacent to the pipe, with only minimal disturbance of the environment.

why stopaq STOPAQ® produces and supplies worldwide a broad range of innovative patent defended self-healing anti-corrosion solutions. The self-healing systems with unique viscoelastic properties prevent corrosion of your valuable assets for life. STOPAQ® systems are maintenance-free and seal completely and permanently any substrate against the ingress of water, oxygen, bacteria or AC/DC current.

why polyken Polyken® pipeline tape coating systems provide pipeline protection with cold-applied and fused tape coating products for various climates and environments. With a full range of multi-layered coating systems and a host of coating accessories, Polyken® is ready to respond to customers anywhere around the globe.

why covalence Covalence® heat shrink force technologies provide strong mechanical strength performance and corrosion protection for oil, gas and water transmission pipelines. With technology born of the atomic age, shrink sleeves are unique in their ability to perform safely and efficiently.

why powercrete Powercrete® is a solvent free epoxy coating used for rehabilitation, directional drilling, girth weld protection, bends, fittings and odd shapes, offshore applications, patch and repair and potable water applications. Powercrete® epoxies are designed to meet the requirements of the most demanding pipeline applications.

Summer 2018

Securing a water supply or Mumbai ONE

COMPANY.

FIVE

SOLUTIONS.

FIGHTING CORROSION.

SEALING THE FUTURE

During heating of the Covalence shrinkable backing to its required force,

POLYKEN® tape coating systems provide proven long term corrosion prevention utilizing cold-applied and fused tape coatings. For more than 55 years, the Polyken® tape coating systems have been utilized to protect pipelines against corrosion in various climates and environments around the world Versatile and unique, always.

+31 (0) 599 69 61 70 | info@sealforlife.com

sealforlife.com

the More Heat Indicator will disappear!

Creating water pipelines to fight water scarcity remains one of the greatest issues of our time, and a key focus for the Seal For Life team. In India, where the population tops 1.3bn and cities grow exponentially, making water and sanitation infrastructure available to the entire population is one the biggest challenges for the Government. Immediate, large-scale infrastructure investments are required, but every investment must be well-considered and should meet exact certification and value criteria. The end goal – a sustainable, safe and long-term water supply – must remain at the forefront of everybody’s minds.

Recently, our team extended our work in Asia by joining a major water supply project in Mumbai, the business capital of India and one of the most densely populated cities on the West coast of the country. This ambitious 88-inch diameter pipeline will extend 98km across the state of Maharashtra. Following a two-year construction period, the pipeline will serve half a million citizens of the waterdeprived Mira Bhandyar district with fresh drinking water. Security of supply was paramount in planning the carbon steel pipeline, which led SFL to be invited to bid for the provision of coating solutions in the Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) tendering process.

At the forefront of the minds of the Mumbai Metropolitan Regional Development Authority (MMRDA) representatives, was to select suppliers with the relevant experience, skills and value-engineered products that would meet all regulatory and project criteria. In partnership with L&T (Larson & Toubro), the SFL team supplied a winning bid to provide Polyken® YG-III tape coating for main line pipe coating and Covalence® WPC65M heat shrink sleeves for the field joint coating. Key to the success Abhishek Kapur, Sales Manager of India, said SFL’s experience and technical support was

the key to the success. He said: “Having satisfied the AWWA (American Water Works Association) standards chosen as a reference point for the coatings, we were also able to demonstrate our successful track record of product used on water pipelines over the past 10-15 years in India and beyond. This, coupled with the ongoing local technical support we will extend during pipeline manufacturing / coating and project execution, proved a powerful combination.”

many such crucial projects in the past particularly in the water scarce states of India, such as Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. We have successfully demonstrated our business as a solution provider for pipeline protection against corrosion. It gives us immense pleasure to be a part of this project which not only brings business value to SFL but also brings smiles and relief to many households in India.”

The size of the pipeline means that this is a truly global project for SFL, with our production team in Franklin, Kentucky, USA, joining colleagues in Europe and India in executing the program of works. Abhishek said: “This was a project of national importance and was monitored directly by the Chief Minister of the State on a regular basis. This pipeline will stretch from the Surya Water Dam to a new water supply treatment plant in Mira Bhandyar, and will change lives by bringing a steady supply of clean drinking water to those who need it most. Everyone at SFL is excited and proud to be a part of it. “The SFL team has been associated with

Abhishek Kapur Sales Manager India

Summer 2018

How Stopaq set a new standard were tape manufacturers who were reluctant to include our Stopaq coating in the ISO standard. “We had to explain our technology and the way our coating should be tested over and over again. Finally, in 2008 a Stopaq coating in the standards was accepted by the ISO committee. A proud moment arrived in 2016 with the revision of ISO 21809-3 confirming that Stopaq was included as a separate type of coating and had opened their own chapter in the process. “This means Stopaq is not comparable to any traditional coating systems,” says Henk. “We have a specific quality that is guaranteed.”

Henk Vugteveen Research Engineer SFL Industries

Casing filler and cathodic protection: The perfect combination STOPAQ materials and solutions are well known in the market for their excellent longterm performance, which is not dependent upon ideal application circumstances. One of these unique STOPAQ materials is used in our Cathodic Protection solution for areas that a CP current cannot reach in order to protect the object (such as cased pipelines). Cathodic Protection Limit Pipelines at road, river or railway crossings are mainly protected by pipe casings. These casings are installed to reduce or eliminate the mechanical impact on a carrier pipe from traffic loads or soil movement in unstable areas. Moreover, casings also avoid the huge impact on the traffic and environment that would occur if pipes are damaged or ruptured at a location such as a crossing. In such cases, the damaged pipe part can be removed from the casing without the need to completely excavate the area. The new pipe part can then be re-installed and welded onto the existing pipe sections. However, it is no secret that casings do not only offer advantages. They also corrode, so one of the biggest challenges is to offer longterm protection of the cased pipes against corrosion. Where the casing pipe can benefit from protection via the installed CP system, the carrier pipe gets isolated from such by the casing. Due to this isolation from the second line of protection, the carrier pipe fully depends on the external corrosion

optimal performance even when it is used in casings which cannot be fully dried and/or even contain traces of water. Where the casing filler is injected and water is present, the water will be encapsulated and kept at the bottom of the casing and away from the carrier pipe. In this way, the carrier pipe is fully surrounded and in direct contact with

the Stopaq Casing Filler material, and isolated from the environment. The water entrapped at the bottom of the casing pipe is therefore isolated from staying active, and the CP will ensure that no corrosion of the casing pipe occurs in the event that the coating on the casing pipe fails.

Water entrapment inside casing due to failure of the mechanical end-seals.

protection system installed as its first line of protection, and on its condition after installation into the casing. To avoid exposing pipelines to the risks described, Stopaq’s Casing Filler is considered the most suitable method for filling the annulus space of pipeline casings. This high-dielectric material is hot-installed by a heat-tank truck and pumped down the casing vent as a hot liquid. Different from alternative solutions offered to the market, the hot Stopaq Casing Filler allows the annulus to be 100% filled during installation, whereas the alternative systems only allow a 70-80% filling that therefore leaves parts unprotected and vulnerable to risk. After the Stopaq Casing Filler has cooled down, it forms a Visco Elastic compound fully encapsulating the objects and capable of absorbing movements of the casing without this causing an impact on the carrier pipe. Philosophy STOPAQ B.V. invests highly in Research & Development to maintain its technological lead through its unique materials, as well as to develop new applications or to update existing ones. Testing and research are carried out in its state-of-the-art laboratory at Stadskanaal, where a complete test field is also available to simulate many examples of installations in practice. By simulating installations in this way, SFL is capable of providing its clients with the best proven solutions. The STOPAQ Casing Filler solution has been carefully designed while taking environmental challenges into consideration. By keeping the density of the Casing Filler materials at a level lower than that of water, we are able to guarantee

Encapsulation of the entrapped water.

Alternative casing filler materials transfer water onto the carrier pipe, supporting the galvanic reaction by creating electrolytes.

Full encapsulation of the carrier pipe by the Stopaq Casing Filler compound. Water can be drained from the casing.

STOPAQ Casing Filler Benefits • Immediate molecular adhesion, even to wet surfaces • Full protection of the casing and carrier pipe • Full electrical separation of the casing and the carrier pipe, with no CP interference • Fast & easy application • Application during operation (no shutdown of the pipelines required) • Non-curing system: filler material remains flexible • No breakdown of the casing filler material over time (no cracking or shrinking) • Highly impermeable.

Solid technology, viscous coating Stopaq coatings have been produced at our own production plant in Stadskanaal and sold and applied world-wide for more than 20 years. The coating properties, such as minimal surface preparation, ease of application, cold-flow, no disbondment from steel, self-healing, and no aging of properties, are all related to its viscous nature and are now understood and respected in the oil and gas industry. The ISO21809-3 standard helps Stopaq get the product approved and used by our endusers. In return, they get a seal for life.

Henk Vugteveen has worked as a research engineer at Stopaq for more than 10 years and has seen the steady rise of a new viscous coating with unique self-healing properties in the oil and gas industry world-wide. Henk, a chemical engineer and polymer scientist, was involved with the testing and standardization of Stopaq coatings in their own test laboratories and facilities in Stadskanaal, a town of 32,000 people near Groningen city in The Netherlands. Henk says he is excited about the growth in applications and proud to have contributed to Stopaq’s commercial success. He recalls how Stopaq broke new ground in the market and the hurdles it had to overcome on the journey to get the new coating into the ISO standard. Coating surprises in a positive way Stopaq stands for ‘Stop Aqua’ and was originally developed to seal wall penetrations for basement cables against water ingress. Stopaq’s team then modified the product for a completely different challenge - meeting the gas production and transportation challenges faced by Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij BV (NAM) and Gasunie to prevent corrosion of steel gas pipelines. Traditional coatings are based on materials such as bitumen, wax and epoxy which require expensive heavy machinery and heat for their application. Stopaq developed and patented a new coating based on pure polyisobutylene with a game-changing difference: While traditional coatings detach from the steel surface and their properties change over time as they age, Stopaq always wets and covers the steel surface and does not age as it is viscous. Surprisingly, it was also discovered that the viscous nature of the Stopaq coating self-heals small coating defects, a unique property that is highly valued by clients. A plane is not a car ISO standards are used throughout the gas and oil industry to certify coatings and to guarantee their function as a long term corrosion-prevention layer. But Stopaq was new to the market and was therefore not included in any standard. It took a long struggle until that changed 10 years ago. Henk says: “Our aim was to get our Stopaq coating included in ISO standards in order to get the new coating approved and used. So, we started to work together with people from Shell to start testing the product according to typical coating test methods

The next chapter Stopaq has more than 3000 square meters of testing space with all kinds of scale 1:1 test facilities in their backyard. These include a large test street, external test set ups and half-submerged risers replicating splash zones to show customers how Stopaq works in real life situations, including: • The effects of movements of pipes in the ground • The effects of tidal zones on off-shore risers • The effects of back fill on coating properties for coatings as technical assessment back in 2004.” Stopaq joined the ISO working group to work on a new chapter covering “noncrystalline low-viscosity non-cross-linked polyolefin based coatings”. Stopaq was not like other coatings, so new set of tests and requirements were needed. Henk explains: “As an example, a plane is not a car. Planes and cars have similarities and dissimilarities. They are therefore tested

differently and have different requirements, but their function (transportation) is the same. “The same holds for Stopaq and traditional coating types. Each coating type has its own set of tests and its own set of requirements.” Not everyone agreed, as Henk recalls: “We experienced a lot of resistance from other traditional coating manufacturers in the working group. Some manufacturers claimed they produced similar products which turned out to be adhesives and some

Henk says: “We are also able to test the application of Stopaq coating materials in the field in new situations and conditions. We also have the ability with our own diving tank to develop modified Stopaq coating materials and their application under water. Our modified and newly developed off-shore underwater coating will eventually also be included in an ISO standard.” The innovative Stopaq story is one that never ends.

ISO 8504-2, Preparation of steel substrates

of glass transition temperature and glass

Part 1: General

ASTM D 938, Standard Test Method for

before application of paints and related

transition step height

EN 10204:2004, Metallic products - Types of

Congealing Point of Petroleum Waxes,

products — Surface preparation methods —

ISO 11357-3, Plastics — Differential scanning

inspection documents

Including Petrolatum

Part 2: Abrasive blast-cleaning

calorimetry (DSC) — Part 3: Determination

ASTM D 70 [1], Standard Test Method for

ASTM D 1141, Standard Practice for the

ISO 8504-3, Preparation of steel substrates

of temperature and enthalpy of melting and

Density of Semi-Solid Bituminous Materials

Preparation of Substitute Ocean Water

before application of paints and related

crystallization

(Pycnometer Method)

ASTM D 1321, Standard Test Method for

products — Surface preparation methods —

ISO 11357-6, Plastics — Differential scanning

ASTM D 92, Standard Test Method for Flash

Needle Penetration of Petroleum Waxes

Part 3: Hand- and power-tool cleaning

calorimetry (DSC) — Part 6: Determination of

and Fire Points by Cleveland Open Cup Tester ASTM D 2084, Standard Test Method for

ISO 10474:2013, Steel and steel products —

oxidation induction time (isothermal OIT) and

ASTM D 127, Standard Test Method for Drop

Inspection documents

oxidation induction temperature (dynamic OIT) Melting Point of Petroleum Wax, Including

Oscillating Disk Cure Meter

ISO 11124 (all parts), Preparation of steel

ISO 13623, Petroleum and natural gas

Petrolatum

ASTM D 4285, Standard Test Method for

substrates before application of paints and

industries — Pipeline transportation systems

ASTM D 149, Standard Test Method for

Indicating Oil or Water in Compressed Air

related products — Specifications for metallic

ISO 21809, Petroleum and natural gas

Dielectric Breakdown Voltage and Dielectric

ASTM D 4541, Standard Test Method for

blast-cleaning abrasives

industries — External coatings for buried

Strength of Solid Electrical Insulating Materials

Pull-off Strength of Coatings Using Portable

ISO 11126 (all parts), Preparation of steel

submerged pipelines used in pipeline

at Commercial Power Frequencies

Adhesion Testers

substrates before application of paints and

transportation systems — Part 1: Factory

ASTM D 257, Standard Test Methods for

SSPC-SP1 [2], Surface preparation

related products — Specifications for non-

Applied Coatings

DC Resistance or Conductance of Insulating

specification No.1 — Solvent cleaning

metallic blast-cleaning abrasives

Part 2: Fusion-bonded epoxy coatings

Materials

SSPC CS 23.00, Specification for the

ISO 11357-1, Plastics — Differential scanning

Part 3: Fieldjoint Coatings (includes new

ASTM D 695, Standard Test Method for

Application of Thermal Spray Coatings

calorimetry (DSC) — Part 1: General principles chapter for ‘visco-elastic’coatings)

Compressive Properties of Rigid Plastics

(Metallizing) of Aluminum, Zinc and Their

ISO 11357-2, Plastics — Differential scanning

Part 11: Rehabilitation Coatings

ASTM D 937, Standard Test Method for Cone Alloys and Composites for the Corrosion

calorimetry (DSC) — Part 2: Determination

ISO 80000-1:2009, Quantities and units —

Penetration of Petrolatum

[1] American Society for Testing and Materials, 100 Harbour Drive, West Conshohocken, PA 19428-2959, USA. [2] The Society for Protective Coatings, 40 24th Street, 6th Floor, Pittsburgh, PA 15222-4656, USA. [3] America Welding Society, 550 N.W. Le Jeune Road, Miami, Florida 33126, USA.

Rubber Property — Vulcanization Using

Protection of Steel

Summer 2018

ONE

COMPANY.

FIVE

SOLUTIONS.

FIGHTING CORROSION.

SEALING THE FUTURE

Bob Buchanan: “We have a big responsibility” boxes with butyl-based adhesive technology that offers stronger bonds, higher peel values and enhanced environmental aspects.

Bob Buchanan

COVALENCE® is the original inventor of the modern heat shrinkable products. All Covalence products now used Butyl based adhesives for guaranteed adhesion whatever the application. Versatile and unique, always.

+31 (0) 599 69 61 70 | info@sealforlife.com

sealforlife.com

Sales Director Americas

Layer with high protection Our thicker butyl layer offers higher protection against internal welding of the steel, which results in virtually zero carbonization of the adhesive, even at very high welding temperatures. A onelayer application facilitates quicker installation, so customers get more pipe in the ground per day. A permanent

You get what you pay for, as the saying goes. And for an increasing number of clients, superior adhesion has proved to be a compelling reason to choose Seal For Life products over the competition. Above ground, below ground, onshore or offshore, standards of adhesion that are tried and tested are crucial. SFL ticks the

“We know we’ve got the right product, because contractors always request our sleeve, once they have had a chance to install it once.”

change indicator also makes it easy for contractors to know when shrinking of the sleeve is complete. Additionally, cross-linked, high-density polyethylene backing gives higher impact resistance. Tested and tested and tested When it comes to testing, standards adhered to by the American Water Works Association (AWWA) are famously stringent, for obvious reasons, and some have fallen at this hurdle. Not SFL AWWA C216 covers the material, application, and field-procedure requirements for heat-shrinkable, crosslinked polyolefin protective exterior coatings and protective exterior coatings to special sections, connections, and fittings used in underground and underwater steel water pipelines. It requires a minimum on the peel values as determined by the D1000 Standard of ASTM International, the Pennsylvania-

of adhesion performance came on a bell hole dig. Bob Buchanan, SFL’s North America Western Region Sales Manager, said: “Specifications tell the welder that the internal weld needs to not exceed 700F, as once it reaches 900 we could carbonize the adhesive. On the bell hole dig, the backing proved, by its surface irregularities, that the internal temperatures well exceeded the minimums. Big responsibility “We chose to do a peel across the weld zone to see the effects and were impressed with the results. The WAB sleeve still achieved cohesive separation, no carbonization of the adhesive and a peel average of 45.3lbs/in-width. The contractor was delighted with the end result and the project was a perfect example of our commitment to providing lasting solutions, not short-term ones. We have a big responsibility as the ‘lifeguards’ of often vulnerable systems, onshore and also offshore and we take that very seriously. We know we’ve got the right product, because contractors always request our sleeve, once they have had a chance to install it once. That is the best feedback we could hope for.”

based organization that sets technical benchmarks globally for a range of materials. Recently our Covalence® Weld After Backfill Sleeve passed with flying colors, as its technology doubles the minimums and includes a cohesive separation. Adhesion is everything One of many examples of the importance

Summer 2018

PHASE ONE: PROBLEM

How a historical ice skating competition in the Netherlands turned into an innovative new game INTRODUCTION Friesland is a very special province in the north of the Netherlands. Its people have their own language, so street signs and place names are displayed in two languages: Dutch and Frisian. One of Friesland’s best-known features is all the water that’s to be found in the countless long ditches, canals and many lakes dotted here and there throughout the province. Another interesting aspect of Friesland is that from the early Middle Ages onwards, more and more towns were given city rights: in the end, there were 11 of these.

The Eleven Cities Race for Waterfront Brigade

n the olden days, skating was the only way for Frisians to travel long distances in the winter, because not everyone could afford a horse. Ancient records show that even centuries ago, competitions were organised and successful attempts made to visit all 11 Frisian cities in just one day: a round trip of over 200km. Due to the great distance involved, and the heroic character of this competition, the Eleven Cities Race is often referred to as

“The Journey of all Journeys”. Leeuwarden, the capital city of Friesland, is the starting and ending point, just as it has always been. The Eleven Cities Race was first skated in 1909 and is held no more often than once each winter. However, the race can only be organised if the ice is in a sufficiently good condition. In total, fifteen official Eleven Cities Races (on skates) have been held since 1909, the most recent one on 4 January 1997. The race takes participants past the eleven

towns in Friesland that were at some stage given city rights. Besides these eleven historic towns, the race also weaves its way past various villages, although there is no requirement for all of these villages to be ticked off (unlike the eleven towns, which form a compulsory part of the route). Skaters who manage to successfully complete the entire course receive a highly prized award in the form of a small cross. This was designed over a century ago by the Frisian sportsman Pim Mulier, who skated around the eleven Frisian cities in December 1890 and founded the organisation in charge of the first official race. The circular route is skated in a clockwise direction, although until 1933 and in 1941 it was skated in the opposite direction. Living and working on the water More than a century after that first race, thousands and thousands of people now live and work along the many watersides in Friesland. These watersides have in many

cases been timbered with hardwood for as long as anyone can remember, and are exposed to the most unfavourable conditions year after year. What’s more, whenever a small opening appears due to the inevitable rot that will eventually appear, the entire quayside will of course start to weaken. Until recently, it used to be necessary to carry out major repair works from the water bank, often in gardens or factory grounds. All of that changed when Marthijn Gernaat – the owner of a diving company – discovered the unique qualities of Easycoat.

who lived at the water’s edge or had businesses that bordered on one or more canals. Talking to them, he discovered that they had all encountered the same problems over the years: subsidence in the gardens on the edge of the water, and yawning holes between the trench shoring and their garden, loading or unloading area.

What a great discovery Marthijn Gernaat came up with an ingenious idea: what if we tried treating the shorelines that were leaking or damaged (or letting sand through for various other reasons) from the waterside for a change? So he went to explore the possibilities in Friesland – after all, the province had enough water and watersides to look at! Taking with him specially equipped vehicles full of tools and diving gear, he performed test after test.

More and more people along the famous Eleven Cities Race route now know the secret and the success of the Waterfront Brigade, whose solution not only stops the erosion but is also attractively finished and extremely cost-effective – especially in comparison with the costs of carrying out repairs from the water bank, with all the excavations that these require. What’s more, mechanical equipment such as diggers often cannot even get past the homes to reach the watersides.

While doing so, he met countless people

Marthijn decided to call himself the Waterfront Brigade, and looked for an international group of divers to link up with. His discovery proved to be an immediate hit.

PHASE TWO: REPAIR

Easycoat is an ideal emulsion to use to combat shore erosion in combination with Protectamesh (which is sometimes referred to as ‘waffle mats’ due to its cellular structure). This combination does of course need to be applied correctly. Marthijn Gernaat explains, “The guys get a good training course about it here in our centre. Projects that we do abroad are also always led by people who have been trained here.” He adds, “We can definitely say that Stopaq’s products offer us a fantastic solution for this specialised work. We certainly do lots of this kind of thing in Friesland, but also in other parts of the country. The word gets around very quickly. People who have heard of it and who live by the water all want it due to the much lower costs, the quality and the clean appearance. We’ve mapped out how many people live on the waterside in the Netherlands, which is of course a country with lots of water and waterways. Well, all I can say is that there’s enough work for the next few centuries.”

PHASE THREE: RESULT

WATERFRONT BRIGADE TO BECOME WATERFRONTIERS

The Waterfront Brigade will soon be known by a new name: Waterfrontiers. It’s shorter and more powerful. But the concept and working method will remain the same: specialist diving companies and contractors who work in the wet are welcome to join. After specific training to work with Easycoat, they will receive their certification. For more information, please contact STOPAQ SFL on +31 (0) 599 696 170

Summer 2018

Robin John Former Global Sales Director for Covalence

What’s in a name:

Heat-shrinking has been our domain for a long time ogether with Sam Thomas, whose story you can read on the next page, Robin John is one of the best-known members of the Seal For Life family. We asked the retired chemical engineer about his long career at Raychem, followed by Covalence and Seal for Life. Famous for his sensational ‘Beach-Takers’ sales concept, he told us everything that led up to it and how he came up with the idea. Here’s what he had to say. “In 1979, after finishing at university, I started as a chemical engineer at Raychem. I was put in charge of the Gulf States, and was stationed in Dubai. We also spent a lot of time in Kuwait and Iran. It’s hard to imagine nowadays, but Dubai was just a village at the time. You drove on sandy roads from the town, through the desert, towards the oil refineries. That was actually a very romantic time. The country then suddenly started developing in a big way, and lots of expats came into these countries to help with the steep rise in oil production and distribution. But you mustn’t think it was easy, because from the very beginning there were high demands made in terms of the quality you had to deliver. The conditions under which the applications had to be carried out weren’t easy either. High temperatures, damp and salty surfaces were what we were faced with every day. Even then though, we were doing a good job with the heat-shrink applications. The problem was that you had to keep proving you could do it. It took years before the clients were sure that the heat-shrink boys knew what they were talking about. We were also gradually training more and more local people. Yes – it was a pretty good time really! Use good products and good people After this period in the Gulf States, I went to Raychem’s headquarters in San Francisco to take on responsibility for global sales. Whatever job title you may have, you’ve

got to be ready to listen and learn. The main thing I learned there very quickly is that you need to have good people in your team and your company. This may seem logical, but you must take care to never let your standards slip. At a certain moment, we had an amazingly talented guy from Pakistan who had just finished at Stanford University. He was interested in the vacancy we had to look after our interests in Pakistan, and would have to relocate to Karachi. Someone thought we could fill the vacancy very cheaply, but people who are amazingly talented and possess lots of desirable qualities don’t come cheap. So we simply offered this young man a great salary by Pakistani standards, and he made a great success of the job. In other words, if you pay peanuts, you will get monkeys. The same thing applies to our applications and treatments for field joints. There’s always been a market that’s sensitive to price, but over all these years we’ve gathered more and more proof of how well our heat-shrink technology and specifications work in practice. At a certain point, we had built up such a strong name and reputation that people knew they could put blind trust in us. But coming back to the motivation of your team and your people, you can’t just do this with hard cash alone. It’s hugely motivational to celebrate your triumphs together in a fantastic team spirit, of course. But letting people know that you value them and that the work they’re doing is worthwhile is probably the most important thing you can do. So we came up with a way to make this happen. The Beach-Takers In the pipeline business, we’ve got two enemies. We need to fight rust, and we

need to battle against inferior quality. There will always be people who want to smear any old kind of gunk on the field joints for a low price. Those are the two kinds of enemies we face. So I told the sales people, “It’s D-Day, guys! We are going to approach the coast in our small landing craft, and we have to take complete control of the beach and reach the dunes. Whatever it costs. The water that we need to wade through without sinking is the first enemy: it’s the rust. The crossfire is the enemy that doesn’t pay enough attention to quality.” So I thought up the Beach-Takers Award for people who had truly excelled. No big deal financially – no medals, trophies or expensive watches. We just held a BeachTakers meeting once a year, and lined up these excellent achievers in the spotlight. These were the people who had – without fear, and convinced of their abilities – run up the beach and confronted the enemy, as it were. So they stood there in a row, and I read

Digging deep in Holland We’ve built up a considerable reputation throughout the world with our heat-shrink method. But sometimes crazy things happen. Sometimes, your trustworthiness can be put in doubt by other people. It’s of course a competitive market, and the competition never stands still. But I can remember that we had a project in Holland, near the German border. Somehow, one of our competitors had put some doubt into the minds of the people at the large oil firm that we’d done a project for. So we were called back to open stuff up at three locations, in order to check it. I’ll never forget it: at the first joint, selected at random, it took hours for us to get the thing loose. And it looked completely spic and span. At the second place, it was exactly the same story. The foremen came up to us and told us we didn’t need to do the third inspection, because it was clear where the tales had come from. They said, “You and your methods are the best.” We were already working with the 3-layer system.

them some lines from Shakespeare. Poetic lines that these men would never, ever forget. Just imagine all these tough pipeline folks being faced with words from Shakespeare that resounded down the centuries! No, it’s nothing to do with shiny medals or certificates – it’s the appreciation and the fact that your hard work has been noticed by your manager.

“From the upmost of thy head, To the decent and dust beneath thy feet, Thou art a Beach-Taker. Therefore of all these bounds, even from this line unto this, With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads, With shadowy forests and mountains riched, We make thee master. To thee and thine inheritance Be this perpetual.”

application and today’s 3-layer system, but basically Covalence truly is the ‘mother of all heat-shrink systems’, and that’s something they can be pretty proud of at Berry.

Sam Thomas Former Global Sales Director for Polyken

Sam Thomas:

A life full of passion (for tape) nyone who starts a conversation about tape, corrosion and Polyken with Sam Thomas will be talking to him for a very long time. After high school, Sam studied BS Chemistry at Norwich University in Vermont and MS Polymer Science & Engineering at the Polymer Science Institute of the University of Massachusetts @ Amherst. Sam fulfilled his military service in the US Army and became a Captain in the Special Forces’ Intelligence Division. This proved to be an experience that would stand him in good stead later during his extensive and fascinating career in the pipeline industry. It was a career that began in 1972 at the Kendall Company, and which took him into every corner of the world. So let’s start there and hear what Sam has to tell us about the yesterday, today and tomorrow of tape in the oil, gas and water pipeline industry.

What’s in a name At a certain moment, Raychem was taken over and Tyco wanted to keep the Raychem name. So we had 2 years to think up and change over to a new name we could use for our globally proven heat-shrink application. In the end, we decided on Covalence. It was a different name but exactly the same technology and therefore offered the same reassurance to our clients. But I think that – especially in Asia – there are a lot of people who do not know that Covalence is actually the son and heir of this proven and in fact unmatched technology. Of course there have been various other innovations over the years, such as the cold-apply

Summer 2018

That farmer in Oklahoma “When I started at Kendall in 1972, they were still mainly producing what they called ‘medical bandages’. The Kendall Company actually goes all the way back to the First World War, when they exclusively manufactured medical bandages. That in fact continued into way after the Second World War, because of course there was a big market for them then too. During that time, tapes also started to be produced for industrial purposes. The car industry, especially, was a very important source of orders. Kendall was already producing polyethyleen tapes with great sticking power for its hoses and cable connections; as well as duct tapes for sealing and HVAC applications. “As the story goes, we should be very grateful to a farmer in Oklahoma. When he used this automotive tape for his leaky water pipes, he discovered that it stopped not only the leaks but also the corrosion. The industrial tapes

that Kendall made at the time were thin, but when we started working in the pipeline industry they gradually got thicker and less vulnerable to damage. You could see an enormous change starting about in the late 1960’s and mid 1970’s due to R&D. It was wonderful to be part of these developments. “In the beginning, we produced tapes for pipelines with a 2-inch diameter, but now we’re talking about 144-inch mainlines – a diameter of nearly 3½ meters. And then we went from a single tape to a 3-layer and later a 4-layer system, including the outer wrap that protects the pipes against the various soil-stress influences. During this evolution at Kendall, I was able to work in different departments of the company. That gives you a broad view of what’s achievable in the market. R&D, Manufacturing, Technical Service, Marketing: I worked in each department, and the various disciplines flowed across one another too. In the end, I became General Manager of the Polyken Pipeline Coating Division, where we – especially in the 1980s and 1990s – had quite a few adventures in the most incredibly different countries. “Orders didn’t just come out of thin air. You had to be inventive. For example, we had a Canadian salesman who installed a complete demonstration kit on his truck and drove right through North America with it. You could describe him as a kind of pioneer of our Factory-Applied systems. Anyway, he drove from one potential client to another. When he turned up, they couldn’t resist taking a look. He would go around, wrapping pipelines on the spot. And it worked: seeing is believing. That still applies today, by the way.

Adventures in the Soviet Union “Our export trips to the former Soviet Union and the countries that are now independent, like Kazakhstan, were unforgettable. You’d spend the whole day in negotiations, then come back to your room and find that everything had been turned upside down

and somebody had been searching through your suitcases. When we went to our meetings, we would whisper as we walked through the streets. We always had translators with us, and they had their own translators too. If you went to restaurants without your minders, they were always full, or so we were told. You had to wave a bunch of rubles around, and then the doors would spring wide open to let you in. We gradually built up our sales in the Soviet Union from tens of thousands of dollars to 25 million. Kazakhstan was a fabulous sales area for us. Our strengths were of course the product we offered and the advice we gave too. We often heard that when pipelines had to be inspected at different location, they were checked over and under our products there wasn’t a spot of corrosion to be found. Well, that was a great basis for doing business successfully. You also developed close, longlasting friendships there. And further afield, as well. “Really, where didn’t we go? We went everywhere from Belgium to Libya, Argentina, Poland, Croatia and Italy. From Algeria all the way to Mexico. It truly has become a complete global business these days. And back then, things were moving pretty fast. In 1988, our division was taken over by LBO, but we kept the Kendall name. In 1994, we became Tyco International, and later Covalence Speciality Materials. The corrosion-protecting family just got bigger and bigger, especially when Raychem came along. Adding Raychem immediately gave us an even stronger proposition. With heatshrink technologies on board too, it turned into a good marriage between the two of them: Polyken and Raychem. In 2007, we became part of the Berry family. In 2012, Stopaq – the self-healing Visco-Elastic sealant – was purchased by Berry Plastics, the whole corrosion division was renamed Seal For Life Industries. What we meant by this was that our products give lifelong protection.” R&D hasn’t stood still During Sam’s career, he was around for – and helped bring about – some of the many product innovations and extensions. He comments, “A lot has happened and there have been many of developments since I arrived at Polyken. These days, Polyken makes a wide range of tape coating systems that meet the rigorous demands of on-land and offshore pipelines. We no longer talk

about ‘tape sec’ but about coating systems. Polyken uses expertly engineered hightensile polyolefin backings formulated for resistance to water absorption and soil stress. Nowadays, Polyken’s proprietary cross-linked butyl-alloy adhesives are specially formulated for high bond strength, high shear resistance and long-term stability. And if you’re talking innovation, the latest product extension is Synergyq. It’s a new single-wrap pipeline coating system that consists of a polyethylene backing and a corrosion prevention material with extremely high shear resistance. This system is, that it does require a primer and can be applied with high tension. We can be proud of the fact that the Synergy high-shear coating system meets and exceed international standards for external corrosion protection of pipelines in the oil, gas and water industry.” How Sam sees the future Sam’s last position in Berry for the Corrosion Protection business was as General Manager/Vice President. Until the end of last year, Sam was still involved in Seal For Life as a consultant, although as of January 1st this year he retired completely from SFL. Nevertheless, Sam is very clear when we discuss Polyken’s future and its opportunities: “You can now already see all the large water projects that Polyken is involved in. Not just the faraway ones, in India, but also closer to home here in America – for instance at the Los Angeles Water Project. Water distribution and treatment are getting more and more important on our planet, mark my words. Polyken can play a big role in this. It’s precisely because I know not only the qualities of the products, but also the combination possibilities with the other products within Berry’s corrosion division, that I predict a long and prosperous future. This thought gives me a lot of satisfaction. After all, if you’ve been lucky enough to spend forty years building up a product and can see the possibilities continuing to grow, that’s a great way to end your career.” Hearing him say that brings us to ask him the obvious question of whether, if he lived his life over again, he would choose a career like this. Sam smiles. “Absolutely. I’ve had a fantastic time at Polyken, I’ve worked with people who are still friends and I’ve had lots of adventures. What more could you wish for?”

Summer 2018

Seal For Life at Corrosion 2018

ONE

COMPANY.

FIVE

SOLUTIONS.

FIGHTING CORROSION.

SEALING THE FUTURE

The world’s largest corrosion conference and exhibition came to Phoenix, Arizona, in April, and the Seal For Life team was present to share our products and knowledge with current and potential clients from more than 70 countries.

Shielding or non-shielding? SFL had an exhibit spot offering information on each of our core technologies, and also a space where coating demonstrations took place on a blasted steel pipe. There were also demonstrations of sealing and corrosionprevention solutions offered by STOPAQ® and an SFL conference paper entitled ‘Shielding or non-shielding?’ which aimed to explain more about mesh-backed tapes in salt water and cathodic protection. Delegates got the chance to connect with experts, share knowledge and learn about the latest developments in the global industry. There were also tales of success and failure from corrosion professionals, case studies, networking events and more than 40 symposia and fora, as well as the latest products, technology and services from more than 450 companies on show across 80,000 sq.ft. of exhibition space.

Corrosion 2018, organized by NACE International, brought together 6,000 corrosion engineers, inspectors, researchers, scientists, technicians and others for an unrivaled forum on corrosion protection and alleviation. Bob Buchanan, Sales Director Americas, said the event, from April 15-19, provided an important platform for the company. He said: “It allowed us to showcase our technologies to the corrosion industry and meet engineering colleagues to discuss our engineered solutions. We’re very happy with the way this year’s conference went for us. Our product line is compelling and we had a great story to tell.”

For those who missed it, the conference proceedings, which include more than 400 technical papers, can be accessed at www. nacecorrosion.org (fees apply).

The Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu knew a powerful force of nature when he saw it. “Nothing is softer or more flexible than water,” he said. “Yet nothing can resist it.” If he was around today, Lao Tzu would no doubt be impressed by the efforts of the team behind Covalence®: they’ve proven him wrong.

Ideal for the rehabilitation of pipelines, tanks and other industrial structures. Versatile and unique, always.

Traditionally, in the US-based water pipeline market, a large percentage of asphalt has gone into products. This brings the costs down, but also lowers performance in water. Covalence eschews asphalt in favor of high quality butyl-based solutions. Better and faster The result, as an increasing number of specifiers and contractors will testify, is that the higher performance adhesives in Covalence offer better quality products, fewer adhesion test failures and much faster installation times. Covalence is a brand with a distinguished history of more than 40 years of high performance and a famous former name Raychem. That legacy lives on in Covalence and the brand now thrives as part of SFL and the wider Berry Global, Inc. family.

+31 (0) 599 69 61 70 | info@sealforlife.com

“Water pipelines can be very large in diameter. Differentiation comes in the types of raw materials used and the resulting methods of application. From a mastics standpoint, we eliminated all asphalt from our formulations and use higher quality butyl polymers. That means our cost is higher, but so is performance.”

The Seal For Life brand is deployed in a variety of environments, but in the United States it is the water pipeline market where it is in greatest demand by contractors. Adhesion is the reason and the composition of Covalence is the key to its growing success.

sealforlife.com

ANODEFLEX™ is a unique technology that's offers an effective cathodic protection solution.

He added: “There are two basic types of adhesives – hot melt and mastic. Hot melts or ‘copolymer’ adhesives tend to be for higher temperature and higher performing pipelines. Mastics tend to be for lower operating temperature pipelines, such as smaller diameter gas lines and water pipelines.

It is a cutting-edge 21st century solution, but Bob Buchanan, SFL Sales Director, Americas, said: ‘The technology around crosslinking and stretching polyethylene sheet in order to

And as the ongoing success of Covalence has proved that, in the US water pipeline market, performance is what counts above all else.

A Lesson In The Seal For Life Philosophy make a heat-shrinkable sleeve (which is what Covalence is), goes back to the 70s. Raychem was the pioneer in this and since then others have followed. Today there are still only a few manufacturers of the technology due to the high cost of manufacturing equipment and technology development required.” Xerox of shrink sleeves With their unique history, Covalencebranded products have become the Xerox of shrink sleeves. They are based on crosslinked and stretched polyethylene backings coated with an adhesive. The backings are similar

throughout all products, but it’s the adhesives that really make the difference. Bob said: “Adhesives are formulated for performance under varying conditions of service, largely a factor of how hot the pipeline is operating at. Higher temperature pipelines need higher temperature-resistant adhesives. Saying that, the adhesive also needs to be formulated to be able to be applied efficiently in the field. Each of these factors means that there are a number of products designed for a number of different applications.”

Summer 2018

The contractor’s delight Can a pipe coating be applied and operated in such a way that none of the coating failure modes critically impairs the integrity of the pipeline within the original design life? What would that mean for contractors? ithin Seal for life Industries, we strive to engineer new and better solutions to serve the market. We ‘Dare to Care’, take responsibility and redefine performance. We also have a responsibility to our clients and their contractors alike. It’s commonly known that when it comes to reducing cycle times, increasing safety, taking care of the environment and ensuring the optimal quality of applications, contractors often face huge challenges. That’s because clients tend to put pressure on them to achieve these aims and responsibilities. In order to better serve our clients and the contractors who apply our solutions, Seal for Life has invested heavily in education and research. Instead of merely ‘telling’ clients and contractors about possible product solutions, we have moved to educating them about technologies that

offer better solutions, more advantages and an increase in the quality of the total protection of objects. Clients are increasingly appointing specialists in their companies to understand more about technologies currently on the market and how these could help them retain a clean track record. Moreover, the world is watching oil and gas companies very closely since their operations have attracted blame for various environmental issues. Seal For Life can help them gain the knowledge required. Technology has always been the cornerstone of Stopaq’s success, and this now applies to the entire Seal for Life Industries group. But success does not come from a particular technology alone. Rather, it is generated by the partners and clients who are convinced by the benefits a technology has to offer them. This has also been the case when promoting our Visco Elastic Technology. We have constantly contributed to the level of

Summer 2018

By applying the STOPAQ FAST anticorrosion systems, you can overcome the following typical corrosion problems: • • • • • • • • knowledge in the industry by educating and inspiring the people around us, showing them the different approaches, new opportunities and great advantages that our technology offers, and gaining more experience by putting it into practice. Stopaq (part of the Seal for Life Group under Berry Global) has invested heavily in a technology park that allows us to simulate a huge variety of applications. The whole Seal for Life Group is now able to benefit from this. Within the park, we can test systems that have been applied under a variety of environmental conditions, including for instance different degrees or amounts of humidity, wetness, heat, cold and dust. In order to make this possible, complete pipelines, platforms, tanks and other objects have been built in our backyard. Sabkha, CP, soil stress and mechanical impact can all be simulated in this technology park. All with one goal: never hide! Our aim is to show clients what different technologies have to offer, and reassure them they are making the right choice. This strategic concept of carrying out rigorous product testing while simultaneously educating and inspiring the industry has helped Stopaq to create breakthrough products. It’s also led to the approval of our technology by many oil and

gas companies. Furthermore, it has allowed us to actively approach contractors to show them new solutions and convince them of the advantages of these. Of course, this wasn’t, and still often isn’t, an easy job. Imagine trying to persuade a whole industry to start buying more expensive products that – apparently – last longer and require less human intervention! Who would believe that this kind of thing would be possible? Putting it like this, it sounds crazy, and was initially described as such by our competitors – and even by end users. Yet we managed to get our concept accepted, and our products sold. Progressive clients and contractors have indeed bought into Stopaq, and are fully convinced of the benefits. All the contractors currently working with Stopaq products have come to the same conclusion. They’ve told us, “It might be a more expensive product from a purchasing prospective, but it offers us great opportunities to create savings over the whole coating process.” They’ve also said, “We now are able to do the job more safely, keep the crew motivated, simplify the way the project is organized, and most of all finally get rid of the unpaid ‘clean-up’ work!” That’s why they often approach us about possible new developments. We have built a reputation in the market for being an

innovative partner. It’s something we are very proud of, because we dare to change and be different. To ensure that clients and contractors can carry out each application optimally, Stopaq prefers to be involved in projects at a very early stage. We design our systems to deliver optimal performance in terms of application time, safety and effectiveness. To achieve this, we work very closely with contractors to ensure they have the correct type and size of materials and packaging. Stopaq products are manufactured in our own facility in Stadskanaal Holland and at AlKhobar in Saudi Arabia. The SFL group has production facilities all over the world and does not depend on third-party production. Being fully self-supported, we can meet our clients’ demands. We are also able to cut to size, meaning that we can customize our products in width, length and thickness, add all kinds of backings, and create single-wrap systems and special packaging. When production is finished, the packaging department is able to pack the ready products in such a way that the contractor fully benefits from them. Even for our packaging, we rely on a very close relationship with the applicators themselves. We discuss the way they want to

Cathodic disbondment Issues with Stray, AC and DC current High soil stress Stress corrosion Hydrogen-induced corrosion Undercreep corrosion Spiral corrosion Osmosis

have the goods shipped, whether these should be packed for ease of application or storage, to minimize waste, or for another priority. We can always come up with the right design. The above-mentioned service is the reason why many offshore contractors like to work closely with Stopaq when they need to apply our materials on subsea pipelines. On board of the laying vessels, there is no room for error. Any mistake that may occur during the coating of a field joint will result in the interruption of the whole laying process. Considering that laying vessels cost a huge amount of money per hour, errors should be avoided at all times. What’s more, incorrect applications caused by disregarding the strict application procedure or disrespecting the environmental conditions can cause a system to fail even before the line is in use. Such failures may lead to needing to pull back the line, cut it and repeat the whole process. Experience has proven that the SFL approach is unique. It’s shown by the way we think, act and get involved in the whole project. It’s our mission to serve our clients with ‘cradle to grave’ solutions, rather than just selling the products we manufacture. We care about education and serve the

The STOPAQ FAST anti-corrosion systems are particularly suitable for use on: • • • • • • •

Oil & gas pipelines Water pipelines City gas distribution pipelines Refinery piping Road crossings Horizontal drilling applications Riser pipes

industry with the best possible solutions which are to benefit of everyone concerned: the client, the contractor, and also the whole community that isn’t directly involved in the pipeline industry but does use what it delivers! We like working FAST We’ve used a similar approach to develop and introduce our new Factory-Applied Stopaq Technology (FAST). Our goal was to create the possibility to coat complete pipes on-site or in a temporary or permanent factory. We decided that the quality of the application should always ensure optimal performance from the system applied, and not be dependent on ideal conditions. It’s now been a few years since we brought our first FAST plant to execute a job on-site. Since then, many projects have followed in Holland, Mexico, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, and most recently in Singapore. The SFL team in Asia has built on the strong relationship it has had with FGE for many years, resulting in a great partnership in Singapore to develop the FAST market in the region by introducing the system to clients and enabling them to benefit from this fast and flexible method of coating complete pipelines. FGE has in fact invested in a FAST line to enable a wide variety of system applications, ranging from GRE

(Glass Reinforced Epoxy) to PE, PVC, or EPDM mechanical layers on top of the corrosion preventative Stopaq Visco-Elastic layer which is applied directly onto the pipe body. This Stopaq Basecoat shows excellent wetting on all surfaces, including steel, PE, PP, FBE and others. Its combination of low surface tension and the fluid-like behavior of the coating causes full impregnation of the complete surface into the finest pores, thereby favoring corrosion prevention. The coating does not require an anchor profile to ensure that adhesion occurs, unlike the commonly used epoxy coating materials or adhesives which bond mechanically. The application of this Visco-Elastic primer layer can take place after minimum surface preparation as ST2 derusting. No more weak spots The application of the field joint coating system involves using the same materials as on the mainline coating, and so the primary layer also consists of the same non-curing, non-crosslinkable, fully amorphous, liquidlike polymer composition. This ensures that these two flow together after application at all times and under any circumstances, thereby eliminating any weak links. Furthermore, it does not require preheat or blast angles for adhesion, which means there can be no adhesion failure or cathodic disbondment.

Summer 2018

Powershield XT:

ONE

COMPANY.

FIVE

Another powerful Powercrete® solution

SOLUTIONS.

FIGHTING CORROSION.

SEALING THE FUTURE Our Powercrete® coatings family has welcomed its latest addition with the arrival of Powershield XT to the market Powercrete® products offer a leading range of 100% solid liquid pipeline epoxy products, known as an optimal solution in the field of pipeline coatings. Powershield XT joins a group with a variety of specialised uses: • •

With over 20 years of experience in the pipeline industry, POWERCRETE has established its reputation based on tried and tested results in the harshest environments and conditions. Versatile and unique, always.

Liquid Pipeline Coating Technology

+31 (0) 599 69 61 70 | info@sealforlife.com

• •

sealforlife.com

POWERCRETE is an epoxy ceramic pipeline coating designed for the toughest and most demanding pipeline coating applications.

•

Launched by Seal For Life as an additional mechanical protection for Horizontal Directional Drilling (HDD) or other applications requiring damage protection in the most demanding applications, Powershield XT promises to deliver superior protection when used in conjunction with other coating solutions. It is also ideal in situations where a contractor must carry out a directional drill but does not have Powercrete® products available or must supplement conventional coatings where mechanical protection is required. Applying Powershield XT over the primary corrosion coating will deliver superior performance. While commodity epoxies have found a niche for everyday use due to their low cost and high-volume sellers, Powercrete® products are favored by experienced contractors for use in directional

drilling and severe service applications due to their higher performance. Bob Buchanan, SFL Sales Director - Americas, said our Powercrete® range has evolved due to consumer demand: “In many cases it is down to user preference, whether that is a specifier or a contractor who likes the handling characteristics of one product versus another. “With Powercrete’s long history of performance, some customers may use the commodity epoxies for low risk applications and Powercrete® products when there is any concern about potential for damage or when performance really matters.” SFL launched Powershield XT earlier this year and with its first orders secured, the focus is now on building demand through 2018 and beyond.

Powercrete DD: An abrasion resistant overcoat (ARO) commonly applied to Fusion Bonded Epoxy (FBE) coated pipe in a coating plant Powercrete J & R60: Field-applied joint coating products commonly used with directional drilling (DD) coated pipe Powercrete R65 F1: A fast cure, field applied direct-to-metal corrosion and abrasion resistant coating Powercrete R95 & R150: higher temperature resistant products for direct-to-metal corrosion and abrasion resistance Powershield XT: A specialty polyurethane-based outer wrap for severe service mechanical protection

Summer 2018

Green Revolution:

ONE

COMPANY.

The end of asphalt and bitumen adhesives

FIVE

SOLUTIONS.

FIGHTING CORROSION.

SEALING THE FUTURE The Seal For Life strategy is deep rooted in longevity. We wish to supply products that work for the long-term but that also have the minimum possible impact on the environment. To do this, we operate a culture of continuous improvement. We constantly examine every product and process to see if they can be enhanced.

Covalence sparked the invention of the Heat Shrink Sleeve

adhesives for guaranteed adhesion whatever the application. Versatile and unique, always.

sealforlife.com

Indeed, our quality is often copied but never bettered. All Covalence products now used Butyl based Rely on the original: Covalence.

sealforlife.com

Often copied, never bettered COVALENCE® is the original Covalence® - inventor ofof thethe heat shrink sleeve technology inventor modern heat - offers a broad range of field joint coating solutions. Applied worldwide products. under theshrinkable most diverse conditions.

Recently, we spotted a performance opportunity in our Covalence® heat shrink sleeve systems. Covalence® products comprise the original Raychem products and have led the corrosion protection market for more than 40 years. Raychem was the inventor of shrink-sleeve technology and introduced it for anti-corrosion purposes.

they are less effective than butyl-based adhesives over the long-term. Consequently, SFL has extended our butylbased adhesives offer, and are no longer using asphalt or bitumen-based adhesives in the Covalence® range. Covalence® Product Manager Katrien Masschelein said the change was a win-win for both SFL and our customers. “Product quality has been improved, and by moving to a solely butyl-based offer, we have improved the air quality in our manufacturing plants. Butyl also means less fumes at the point of installation, as the adhesives are heated with open flame torches during application.”

Covalence® shrink sleeve products are often used as two-layer girth weld coating in water, gas distribution and offshore pipelines because of their strong mechanical strength and ease of installation. Butyl-based adhesives have the future Many heat shrink sleeves used butyl-based adhesives, but some used asphalt and bitumen-based materials. Asphalt and bitumen-based adhesives can be cheaper, but evidence has emerged to suggest that Katrien said performance evaluations, including 100 days heat-aging and full hot water immersion tests, had shown butylbased adhesives offer more stable performance and superior adhesion strength for the long-term. Unlike asphalt-based adhesives, the butyl solution offers no swelling near high-stress areas such as the closure patch. Asphalt-based adhesives can also become harder and more brittle, potentially leading to an increased risk of microbially-induced corrosion.

+31 (0) 599 69 61 70 | info@sealforlife.com Katrien Masschelein Covalence® Product Manager

Not just a slogan Full sets of EN and ISO standard testing,

plus customer evaluations, have supported this change to the Covalence® range. Katrien said: “I’m very proud to take yet another step in making all our products perform to the levels demanded by our strategy. ‘Seal For Life’ is not just a slogan – it’s how we expect our products to perform, based on proper long-term test data.” Superior value Bob Buchanan, SFL Sales Director for the Americas, said: “We have always had butyl adhesive technologies so this was an extension of what we have been doing for years. Our customers have performed their own evaluations and have been very positive about the changes, as they understand the superior value butyl-based adhesives provide.

Multifunctional and easy The Covalence DIRAX system is a patented three-layer formulation designed specially for HDD installations. Covalence® also provides sleeves for sealing in the district heating and cooling markets. Covalence® heat shrink sleeves meet all relevant global standards (ISO, EN, AWWA, NACE, GOST) ensuring suitability for pipeline applications and special field conditions. Covalence® sleeves come in various thicknesses and can accommodate any diameter pipe. Easy-to-understand installation instructions are shipped with every product and clear product labelling allows rapid on-site identification.

“I have worked across the heat-shrinkable sleeves industry for two decades and can see the differences between products in the market. I believe our asphalt-free adhesives are higher performing products and safer to manufacture and use, so I am very proud to tell people that.” Covalence® sleeves are offered in a twolayer and three-layer construction that complements a wide range of onshore and offshore pipe coating applications.

Bob Buchanan Sales Director Americas

Summer 2018

CASE STUDY: Cor Prins explains the value being delivered to the booming wind sector Gemini case

Nordergründe case

Location Dutch North Sea

Location German North Sea

Developer Northland Power Inc.

Developer OWP Nordergründe GmbH (subsidiary of WPD AG)

Operator Northland Power Inc.

Cor Prins Global Technical Director

Operator OWP Nordergründe GmbH

Owner Northland Power inc. /Van Oord Dredging and Marine Contractors/ HVC Groep STOPAQ® B.V. was asked to offer a suitable system for the repair of coating damages on 72 Monopiles on the Gemini project. The internal coating damages are repaired under challenging environmental Offshore conditions during December 2016/January 2017. Applied are a two-layer EasyQote® system for the interior repairs and a one-layer EasyQote® system to repair the external coating damages.

Cor Prins has been in the coatings world for a long time. After spending a number of years as Technical Sales Manager for Germany at the Carboline Company, Cor moved to Stopaq five years ago, where he is currently Global Technical Director. In this role, he is focusing on the booming market for wind turbines, where Stopaq has a great new innovation to solve problems in this field… Talking to Cor at Stopaq’s Headquarters in Stadskanaal, in the north-east of the Netherlands, he tells us all about it.

Our basic Stopaq product was already a good fit to for being used on wind turbines, but there were some flaws which the new product extension resolves. It was actually a logical next step, but you need to first invent it and then perfect it. With our Visco Elastic Stopaq application, we have of course built up years of experience in the most diverse circumstances. We know how corrosion originates and how you can prevent it. Under almost all conditions. What we have now is indeed the result of further development, listening properly to clients and looking at what is now happening with regard to building wind turbines and everything else that this involves. For instance, what the requirements and challenges are, often at great heights. What’s interesting is that some of our clients – along with the people who actually hang in the hoists and have to carry out the work – call our invention a ‘plaster’.

Owner Gothaer Leben Renewables GmbH/WPD Offshore GmbH/ John Laing Group plc.

you can simply cut to size. It can be as big or small as you like. It’s a coloured Basecoat that’s based on our Easy-Qote product, which means it has all the same proven characteristics. The patch is in total 1mm (1000 microns) thick, and comes with a thin, self-cleaning film. The beautiful thing about this system is that it’s so practical to use. As you can imagine, when windmills are being built, there’s almost always some damage during the assembly stage. That kind of thing is just about unavoidable. But we can then very simply treat the damaged areas. First we degrease them, manually remove any rust that has appeared, and measure the dew point. In these kind of salty environments, you can’t leave anything to chance, but with this technology, the wellknown Bresle Test doesn’t need to be carried out. That’s a unique advantage. Then we apply the right size of patch in the same color as the wind turbine itself.

STOPAQ® B.V. was asked to offer a suitable system to seal and protect the external flange connections of all 18 Monopiles of the Nordergründe project. Due to its its patented 100% pure P.I.B. technology, the flange seals will be permanently protected against water ingress and corrosion. The installation was done Offshore by rope access. Just cleaning the coated substrate and apply the one-layer EASY-QOTE® system.

experiences with one of the end users or construction firms – such as Van Oord, Boskalis, GeoSea or Tennet, in our case – the news spreads quickly.

traditional coating systems. Instead, you can protect the surface by always applying a layer of the correct thickness in just one action.

originally applied coatings as they don’t harden, which means they don’t discolor through age. Application takes only a fraction of the normal repair time, too.

It’s also worth remembering that more and more windmill parks are rapidly springing up in Europe, especially in the North Sea and Baltic Sea, in 2017 alone Europe invested 51.2bn* into the wind energy industry. Various parks are being built along the Belgian, Dutch, English, German and Danish coastlines, and on the mainland too. People are also busy working on plans for an artificial island for power conversion. The enormous rise in wind turbine parks is of course also being caused by the Climate and Energy Agreement, whereby 14% of energy requirements should be provided by renewable energy in 2020 and 16% in 2023.

The news is spreading The great thing is that the benefits of these applications quickly get passed on by word of mouth, including to the conglomerates that build these wind turbine parks. Once you’ve got a good reputation and had good

The ultimate goal is a 49% reduction in CO2 emissions. Previously, the industry was heavily subsidised, but the latest wind parks are being built without any subsidies. The leader in wind energy is China, followed by Europe, the US and Asia/Oceania.

STEP FOUR

STEP FIVE

A plaster? Yes, that’s right – a kind of plaster that you can use to fight corrosion. It’s a patch that

This working method has other advantages too – for instance, when you are doing these kind of repairs, you don’t need to build up the system in several layers like you do with

Lets not forget that these turbines can be 250 meters high. Dealing with something like that, our method is a lot easier and quicker than reparatory treatments with the original multi-layer systems. Our patches are also an excellent match with the existing,

STEP ONE

STEP TWO

STEP THREE

Wherever there are wind turbines Everywhere that wind turbine parks are being built, we’re in the picture with our rehab patch. We are focusing on the damage to coatings that’s caused during the installation of the parks, and on maintenance once these are in use. Especially for offshore applications, our system offers considerable advantages over traditional coating systems. The fact that it can be applied using rope access, the minimal surface pre-treatment required, and the advantage of not having to mix it and take account of the workable time of the system, make it extremely attractive for clients to apply the Easy-Qote system. After all, it saves the park owners a huge amount of money in maintenance and repair costs. Plus, we can offer them all the certainties gained from our years of experience in working under the most difficult conditions. The reactions that we’ve heard from the market are all extremely positive. Without exception.

STEP SIX

STEP SEVEN

FINAL RESULT

Summer 2018

Latin America welcomes Carl Gudme ONE

COMPANY.

FIVE

SOLUTIONS.

FIGHTING CORROSION.

Carl Gudme Sales Manager South & Latin America

Carl Gudme is Seal For Life’s new man in Latin America, bringing with him vast experience of our products and the marketplace. He took over as our Business Sales Manager, South & Latin America, in January after making a big impression while working on a part-time basis in the same role covering his native Brazil.

SEALING THE FUTURE Proven to Seal For Life against the ingress of water, oxygen, bacteria or AC/DC currents. STOPAQ® byalways. far the most environmentally-friendly protection systems in the anti-corrosion Versatile andoffers unique, protective world. 100% stable, 100% self-healing and 100% bonding guaranteed! STOPAQ is part of Seal For Life Industries; we can also offer you combined technologies for the most complex applications, wherever in the world, whatever the circumstances.

+31 (0) 599 69 61 70 | info@sealforlife.com

Another benefit of Carl’s appointment will be his extensive contacts and his status as an influencer in this market.

sealforlife.com

STOPAQ is the ORIGINAL self healing, visco-elastic coating.

Fluent in Portuguese, Spanish and English, Carl contributes 25 years’ experience of managing business development and technical sales in the region. He has worked for global energy companies such as Chevron and Shawcor, and specialized in coatings and non-metallic pipes and anti-corrosion products for the pipeline industry.

Carl’s new responsibilities are many and varied, and include: • Establishing consistent leadership across Latin America, working closely with our agents and distributors • Centralizing marketing intelligence for our brands, and implementing accurate project tracking to improve internal communication, maximize expertise, promote collaboration and secure shortterm projects • Identifying business development opportunities for the STOPAQ® product line outside our traditional oil and gas business, including strategic alliances with service providers • Providing direct guidance to the Americas Sales Director on product strategies by country to maximize our growth. His in-tray is already full, with work under way to develop business development and sales in markets and countries with potential growth and updating and implementing product portfolio Field Joint Coatings (FJC) specs on upcoming high-profile pipeline projects in Latin America. Born in São Paulo and now resident in Rio

de Janeiro, Carl has a Bachelor’s degree in Production Engineering from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and an MBA in Marketing and Finance from the Catholic University of Rio. He said: “I am very excited about my new job, and I feel confident that I will contribute strongly to the team on sales growth of all SFL products in Latin America. “The STOPAQ product line will be an important part of this business growth in the region. We will be entering new markets and selling to new customers for viscoelastic technology products, such as all major national oil companies in Latin America.” Carl has been married to Elaine for 31 years and the couple have three children, Nicolas, Jan and Nina. Away from the office, Elaine and he compete in half marathons, endurance and sprint triathlons and are keen hikers. He also has one other key objective for this year: “South Americans like football, and I am no exception. I am looking forward to watching the Brazilian team at the World Cup in Russia.” SFL Americas Sales Director Bob Buchanan said: “Carl and I started working together in about 1998 for a competitor.

“Carl was hired as South American regional sales manager and my role was to assist the region technically and marketing wise in developing what was an under-served market, so we spent quite a bit of time visiting customers, developing the distribution network, and attending trade shows to build the business there. “One of Carl’s key strengths is navigating the cultural variabilities of a continent with multiple countries and cultural

differences. Brazil is the largest country in South America but is Portuguese-speaking, whereas the remainder of South America is Spanish-speaking. Carl’s native language is Portuguese but he is also fluent in Spanish and English. Between that and his demeanor, he has been well accepted throughout. He has a strong understanding of our market and product technologies and is making an immediate impact. We expect great things from him.”

Summer 2018

G R E AT EVENTS

Why coated steel corrodes Tape with pressure sensitive adhesive

2-component liquid coating

Pure homopolymer Polyisobutene based Stopaq Wrappingband

NACE Central Area Conference & Expo USA

Water absorption and penetration

6 - 8 August 2018 NACE Corrosion Technology Week

Absorption

Diffusion

Break-through

USA

Gastech Exhibition and Conference Spain

Coating

Steel

16 - 20 September 2018

May become manifest as a sudden decrease in specific electrical insulation resistance.

17 - 20 September 2018 TIME

Congresso Mexicano de Petroleo Mexico 26 - 29 September 2018

Go with the cold-flow

Field Joint Coating

But that is where the problems can begin. Many types of coatings adhere to the substrate by mechanical fixation, and in order to achieve proper adhesion strength, a certain ‘roughness profile’ is required to obtain a larger area of adherence and anchor profile compared to smooth surfaces. This can be imagined as the difference between rubbing your palm over a plastic sheet or over a piece of sand paper, the latter giving more resistance to movement.

UK 9 - 10 October 2018 H20 Italy 17th October 2018 Offshore Energy 18 The Netherlands 22 - 24 October 2018

Erik Broesder Technology Director Stopaq

ADIPEC Abu Dhabi 12 - 15 November 2018 Pipeline Coating USA 13 - 14 November 2018 The Big 5 Construction Dubai 26 - 29 November 2018 NACE Western Area Conference USA 27 - 29 November 2018

Erik Broesder is Technology Director of Stopaq B.V.’s 3000 square metre facility in Stadskanaal, Netherlands. He joined the company in 2009 after two years running his own laboratory. Prior to that, he was with Philips Semiconductors for 18 years, ten of them as head of their analytical laboratory. He explains the secret behind the Stopaq success. Making it stick “Coatings are generally applied to steel surfaces to protect them from corrosion caused by the electrochemical reactions of iron in the presence of oxygen and water. Before application, the steel substrate must be cleaned of foreign matter –oil, grease, dust, dirt, salt, and corrosion products.

For example, a typical roughness profile for curing liquid epoxy coatings is 75 microns. To obtain surface roughness, various techniques are used, such as abrasive blast cleaning. Water vapour is absorbed in coatings in minute amounts and when a coating adheres perfectly to the substrate, there is equilibrium between the amount of water vapour entering the coating and leaving it. Filling the void “However, when bare steel spots remain under the applied coating – such as lack of adhesion of coating to the substrate – there is a risk of corrosion occurring underneath the applied coating.

while tapes may be hampered by the rubbery elastic characteristics of the pressuresensitive adhesives that insufficiently limit the flow. Stopaq’s corrosion-preventing Wrappingband materials are made of pure homopolymer Polyisobutene, a Polyolefin with a high-viscosity liquid nature down to its glass transition temperature – as low as -65 degrees Celsius. In contrast to many other coatings, it adheres to substrates by intermolecular forces, such as van der Waals forces.

“Stopaq is often seen as a rookie.” When applied over a roughened substrate, the compound of the Wrappingband flows into the finest pores and all bare steel spots are covered with a film of Polyisobutene compound, which has many other properties beneficial for long-term protection of steel against corrosion. It has low water vapour permeability, a high electrical resistance, does not cure or harden, and its properties are unaffected by ageing and weathering.

When voids occur, water vapour migrates into the void between coating and steel, and condensates on the surface of the steel. This is even more severe when salt residues are present; they lead to water retention and accumulation at the steel substrate, a phenomenon called osmosis.

We’re no rookies As coatings based on Stopaq Wrappingband are different from all other types of commonly used coatings in the oil and gas industries, and despite the fact that we have already been supplying products to the market for more than 20 years, Stopaq is often seen as a “rookie”.

The capability of many types of coatings to cover the entire roughened substrate is limited due to their characteristics. Liquid epoxy coatings, for instance, may already have been partially cured before the entire substrate has been wetted with the coating,

Therefore, end-users often need to witness and inspect our extensive in-house testing to international standards before they commit to use Stopaq coating systems. This is something we take very seriously and it’s important that sufficient time is spent with

end-user delegates to show them test activities and results and explain everything about the product. We recently had delegates from an oil company present for an entire week to witness in-house tests and afterwards they admitted: “You have vast knowledge about coatings in general, your products, and test methodologies.” I’ve learned during my career at Stopaq that you should always make your promises come true with regards to the product’s characteristics and specifications. I recently had a meeting of the ISO working group for the development of a new standard. Members were present from Canada, Germany, France, the UK and other countries. During the meeting the subject of MIC – Microbiologically Influenced Corrosion – came up. One of our biggest clients was present and said that they have vast experience with MIC occurring on bitumencoated pipes that are in service for long time. Part of their maintenance strategy is to repair severely damaged coatings or corroded spots – as revealed by frequent pipe surveys – with an appropriate type of coating compatible with the existing one. They investigated suitable repair coating materials, and they especially examined recurrence of MIC after coating repair and found that repair with new bitumen coating is not adequate for mitigating MIC – it recurred within a year. But when they carried out repairs with a green wrapping material with cold-flow – that fully sealed and isolated the pipe from its environment – it effectively mitigated MIC. He didn’t mention the product name, but everyone in the audience immediately knew which one it was… a coating based on Stopaq Wrappingband.”

Ideal situation Water vapour exiting Water vapour penetrating

Water molecules merely penetrate into the coating and are absorbed, while an equivalent number are evaporated from the coating so that the amount of moisture in the coating (moisture absorption) remains constant.

In practice Water vapour penetrating

Condensation and accumulation of water. Likelihood of corrosion!

Water vapour exiting, far less than amount that’s penetrated.

Summer 2018

ONE

COMPANY.

FIVE

SOLUTIONS.

FIGHTING CORROSION.

SEALING THE FUTURE sealforlife.com

Committed to never compromising on quality, and always pushing the boundaries to bring you new and innovative solutions for the corrosion problems of tomorrow. We are Seal For Life, the only solution provider who can offer you 5 corrosion prevention technologies, and advise on the most appropriate solution, without bias. Versatile and unique, always.

STOPAQ ® SELF-HEALING CORROSION PREVENTION

POLYKEN ®

COVALENCE ®

PIPELINE TAPE TECHNOLOGY

HEAT SHRINKABLE TECHNOLOGY

ANODEFLEX ™ CATHODIC PROTECTION TECHNOLOGY

POWERCRETE ® LIQUID PIPELINE COATING