ATI 2003® Lean Duplex Alloy Selected for North Sea Project
01/15/2013 - Allegheny Technologies Inc. announced that ATI 2003® lean duplex stainless was chosen over 316L stainless and coated carbon steel for topside secondary and outfitting structural components on a major offshore project in the Norwegian North Sea.
Allegheny Technologies Incorporated announced that ATI 2003® lean duplex stainless has been selected as the material of choice for a full array of offshore topside structural components. ATI 2003 lean duplex stainless was chosen over 316L stainless and coated carbon steel for topside secondary and outfitting structural components on a major offshore project in the Norwegian North Sea. The end user chose ATI’s innovative material to solve both corrosion and weight concerns.
"This selection is another first application and a significant achievement in the market acceptance of the innovative ATI 2003 lean duplex stainless. ATI 2003 alloy creates value for our customers by providing opportunities for significant cost savings and strength-to-weight advantages compared to materials currently employed,” said Rich Harshman, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer of ATI. “For years, 316L austenitic stainless and coated carbon steel have been used for these offshore applications. Recent reports have highlighted undesirable chloride pitting and corrosion cracking with 316L and significant maintenance costs with coated carbon steel in these marine environments.”
Examples of the topside secondary and outfitting structural applications include perforated, roll formed, and fabricated components such as roof and wall panels, structural pipe, pipe supports and clamps, fire doors, blast walls, and fire protection walls.
ATI 2003® (UNS S32003) lean duplex stainless steel (LDSS) is a molybdenum-enhanced, proprietary duplex stainless alloy. ATI 2003 LDSS (20% Cr, 3% Ni, 2% Mo) provides enhanced strength and corrosion resistance and can be an economic alternative to Type 316L (17% Cr, 10% Ni, 2% Mo) stainless. With a Pitting Resistance Equivalency number (PREn) of 30, ATI 2003 lean duplex is a more corrosion resistant, higher strength, and cost effective material for consideration on new platforms having a 40-year design life in the harsh North Sea environment. The calculated PREn value is a popular means of ranking stainless steels for their anticipated resistance to corrosion pitting in aqueous environments. Since 2006, ATI 2003 LDSS has been approved to NORSOK Standard M-650. The NORSOK standards are developed by the Norwegian petroleum industry with broad petroleum industry participation, to ensure adequate safety, value adding and cost effectiveness for petroleum industry developments and operations.
Duplex alloys are a relatively new family of stainless alloys that are gaining attention from end users for their attributes of strength and corrosion resistance over a wide product range. ATI 2003 lean duplex stainless is particularly attractive due to lower raw material content and phase stability which ease fabrication with welding, forming, heat treating, and machining. ATI is a global industry leader offering the market a range of duplex, lean duplex, and super duplex stainless alloys to provide the optimum solutions for strength and corrosion resistance.
Allegheny Technologies Inc. is one of the largest and most diversified specialty metals producers in the world with revenues of approximately US$5.2 billion for the last twelve months. ATI has approximately 11,300 full-time employees world-wide who use innovative technologies to offer global markets a wide range of specialty metals solutions. Its major markets are aerospace and defense, oil and gas/chemical process industry, electrical energy, medical, automotive, food equipment and appliance, machine and cutting tools, and construction and mining. Its products include titanium and titanium alloys, nickel-based alloys and superalloys, grain-oriented electrical steel, stainless and specialty steels, zirconium, hafnium, niobium, tungsten materials, forgings, castings, and fabrication and machining capabilities.
