EN 13480

Covers — metallic industrial piping systems and their supports, above ground, ducted, or buried, independent of pressure. The standard is issued in eight interdependent parts:

• Part 1 — General · Part 2 — Materials · Part 3 — Design and calculation · Part 4 — Fabrication and installation · Part 5 — Inspection and testing · Part 6 — Additional requirements for buried piping · Part 7 — Guidance on conformity assessment · Part 8 — Additional requirements for aluminium and aluminium-alloy piping.

Does NOT cover (exclusions) — the following are governed elsewhere:

• Pressure vessels → EN 13445; unfired shell boilers → EN 12953; water-tube boilers → EN 12952.
• Pipelines (transmission/distribution onshore) → EN 1594 / EN 12007 and related pipeline standards.
• Non-metallic (plastic/GRP) piping → separate EN plastic-piping standards.
• Equipment and services expressly excluded by the PED (e.g., some low-hazard or very low-pressure systems).

EN 13480 is a harmonised standard under the Pressure Equipment Directive; the module of conformity assessment (A, B, F, H, etc.) depends on the fluid group and PED category, not on the piping code alone.

EN 13480 sets minimum requirements across the full lifecycle of a metallic piping system:

• Materials — materials selected and documented per Part 2, drawing on European material standards (e.g., EN 10216 seamless / EN 10217 welded steel tube) with defined material property documentation (e.g., EN 10204 certificates).
• Design — pressure and load design per Part 3: wall thickness, flexibility and stress analysis, and support design, using European allowable-stress and joint-coefficient conventions.
• Fabrication & Installation — cutting, forming, and welding per Part 4, with weld procedures/welders qualified to EN ISO 15614 / EN ISO 9606.
• Inspection & Testing — examination and NDE per Part 5, with extent driven by the PED category, followed by pressure (usually hydrostatic) testing.
• Conformity Assessment — Part 7 guidance links the technical work to the PED module required for CE marking.

The technical evaluations below determine whether a metallic piping system is safe and PED-compliant for its design pressure and temperature.

Pressure Design

Part 3 gives the minimum wall thickness for internal pressure using a joint coefficient and the material's allowable stress derived from European material data. The conventions differ from ASME — allowable stress is set from yield/tensile with defined safety factors rather than the B31.3 tabulated basis.

Stress & Flexibility Analysis

Part 3 also covers flexibility analysis, sustained and thermal stress checks, and stress intensification for fittings, plus reaction loads on equipment nozzles and supports.

Conformity to the PED

Uniquely, the technical output must map to a Pressure Equipment Directive conformity-assessment module; the required NDE extent and third-party (notified body) involvement scale with the PED hazard category.

Where to find it in the code: materials → Part 2 · design/calculation → Part 3 · fabrication → Part 4 · inspection & testing → Part 5 · conformity assessment → Part 7.

Engineering Note: Treat EN 13480 and ASME B31.3 as parallel, non-interchangeable systems; do not mix a B31.3 wall calculation with EN material certificates without a reconciled basis.