VCS managed the company Breivoll Inspection Technologies AS (BIT) for several years. BIT performed condition assessment of metallic water and district heating pipe infrastructure all over Europe.
BIT’s technology (PipeScanners) allowed for detecting inner and outer corrosion of the pipeline, thus enabling replacement of defined pipe segments, rather than replacing the whole pipeline, which is the normal approach worldwide. As pipe segments degrade individually due to differences in metal fatigue and ground conditions where laid, BIT’s approach to management saved infrastructure owners 60-70% of infrastructure replacement cost.
BIT’s technology was sold to the Russian company Unicon Group. The covid epidemic, and thereafter the war in Ukraine effectively put a stop to the use of this technology in Western Europe. The technology, however, is heavily used in Russia, now covering pipes 350 mm < d < 2000 mm, being utilized in metallic and concrete pipes.
