First India Conference is a Big Success

The ASME India Oil and Gas Pipeline Conference — a new conference program financed by the Society's recently launched Strategic Priorities Grant Fund (SPGF) initiative — kicked off in a big way last month. The encouraging response to the new meeting, which drew more than 125 attendees from 11 countries, has its organizers expecting the Oil and Gas Pipeline Conference to become an annual event.

The meeting, which took place Oct. 15–18 at Le Méridien Hotel in New Delhi, was organized by the ASME Strategic Management department, the International Petroleum Technology Institute, and ASME Codes and Standards, and was subsidized through the Strategic Priorities Grant Fund (SPGF). The SPGF program, which was approved by the Board of Governors last year, provides financing for broad-based, cross-sector proposals intended to further ASME strategic initiatives.

The conference — the first ASME event of its kind to be held in India — brought together key corporate players in the onshore and offshore pipeline industry from the United States, Canada, Japan, Korea, Singapore, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Iran, and Kazakhstan, as well as from cities located across India.

The first two days of the Oil and Gas Pipeline Conference consisted of tutorial sessions on pipeline risk management, in-service welding and pipeline repair, integrity evaluations, and inline inspection technologies. The sessions were led by Mahar Nessim of CFER Technologies, Alain Loyer of CogniSpecs Consulting, and Phil Hopkins of Penspen Ltd., the chairman of the ASME Pipeline Systems Division.

On Oct. 17, Hopkins and Ken Paulson of Canada's National Energy Board introduced the symposium portion of the program, during which delegates had the opportunity to learn about new pipeline projects, emerging issues, international standards, and the current state of pipeline engineering throughout the world. Presenters included Eric Anthony Jones, First Secretary at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi; M.S. Srinivasan, secretary of India's Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas; and A.M Uplenchwar, director of pipelines for Indian Oil Corp.

More than a dozen technical presentations made up the balance of the symposium, addressing such issues as learning from pipeline failures, global innovative maintenance technology, new oil and gas pipeline construction projects, pipeline design and operation in harsh environments, and high-pressure and high-temperature thermal buckling. The program also featured a panel discussion of India's emerging regulatory environment and the presentation of "The Future of Gas in India," as well as a number of networking opportunities.

Sponsors for the conference included Engineers India Ltd., T. D. Williamson Inc., India Oil Corp. Ltd., Larsen & Toubro, ESAB India, Punj Lloyd, and HR Solutions. Partner organizations included the Bureau of Indian Standards, the Consortium of Indian Industry, the National Energy Board of Canada, and the Pipeline Research Council International.

For more information, visit the Web site www.asmeconferences.org/PIPELINEINDIA07.

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