The general public has never heard of it, but all engineers working in oil and gas transport know the name of this discreet French SME (50 employees) founded in Louveciennes in 1992. ITP Interpipe is at pipeline what the Roll’s Royce is to the automobile: the ultimate. Having become an expert in conveying fluids at very high temperatures, it operates in what the profession calls the pipe in pipe. In other words: a pipe containing another insulating tube like a thermos. Expensive, its process, protected by several patents, does not apply to long linear gas or oil pipelines but to niche markets in complex terrestrial or underwater environments. The reputation in hardened steel of this blue, white and red nugget (which does not communicate the exact amount of its turnover of several tens of millions of euros) is due to the unequaled robustness of its pipes with high thermal insulation.
« They are the only ones that do not require any maintenance throughout their life. », underlines Vincent Lefèvre, director of the factory installed on the port of Caen-Ouistreham since 2008.
Among its letters of nobility, it can boast of having designed the pipeline hottest submarine ever installed to bring bitumen to Singapore Bay.
LNG: “A sudden boost”
But it is above all the promises of the glacial fluids market that electrify its teams today. In response to divestment from the oil sector driven by the energy transition, the company has diversified its range of pipelines to be able to transport liquefied gases under optimal conditions at very low temperatures of around minus 200° and in particular LNG, including the market has been expanding for several years. An inspired choice in view of the explosion in transport needs for this new blue gold that Europeans are snapping up in the hope of freeing themselves from their dependence on Russian gas.
« Les plans for export terminals from producing countries and import terminals in Europe have undergone a sudden boost confirms its managing director, Pierre Ollier.
Known for having built the first fully buried LNG pipeline in India, the French SME should do well. It has just won a contract in the United States to transport liquefied natural gas intended for export from a refinery to at port terminals and a candidate for a twin project still in the USA. It also covets several markets on the old continent … where demand is (very) pressing, notes Vincent Lefèvre. ” In Italy, for example, a call for tenders that had been dormant for ten years has just been revived for an expected release within three months. ».
Stimulated by its engaging prospects, ITP Interpipe extended its lease on the port of Caen by 15 years and made an investment of ten million euros to double the surface area of its offices and workshops within two years. The company is also preparing to recruit 150 manufacturing employees on the site (handlers, machinists and all types of positions related to metallurgy) in the last half of 2022 to honor the major contract concluded across the Atlantic.
Focus on the energy transition
On the research side, the company focuses its efforts on the challenges of decarbonization. ” ITP is currently developing several technologies as part of the energy transition “says Pierre Ollier. In the boxes in particular, projects around the production of green electricity from geothermal wells with American partners. But also the development of a new generation of double-envelope insulating tubes intended for the transport of liquefied carbon and hydrogen. A choice guided by the multiplication of projects around the capture/storage of industrial CO2 and the uses of H2.
Witness to this bubbling: the Normandy factory recently received a visit from directors of Airbus and Aéroports de Paris. ” They wanted to discuss the feasibility of hydrogen transport infrastructure between storage sites and tracks “, explains Vincent Lefèvre. In other words, places where you don’t mess with security.
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