CORROSION IN OIL PLATFORMS

Corrosion in Oil Platforms

Corrosion in Offshore Oil Platforms

Introduction

The openness of an economy as a result of globalization can and should also be measured by the flows of the services, technology, information and ideas in and out of the borders of a country. One such new phenomenon that germinated as a result of globalization is the offshore oil drilling. For that purpose oil companies make the usage of offshore oil platforms. These oil platforms on one hand provide scores of advantages on the other hand; any fault in these platforms such as corrosion can cause a lot of damages. The aim of this paper is to talk about corrosion in offshore oil platforms from variegated aspects.

Corrosion

Corrosion can be defined as the process in which the deterioration of a material occurs as a result of electrochemical attack by the environment. More generally, the phenomenon of corrosion can be understood as the general trend that materials have to find it's most stable or lower internal energy. Whenever corrosion is caused by an electrochemical reaction or oxidation, the speed at which it occurs will depend to some extent on the temperature, the salinity of the fluid in contact with the metal and the properties of the metals in question. Other materials also corrode metal through other mechanisms (Lambert, 2009). Corrosion can occur through a chemical reaction (redox), which involves three factors. These three factors are as follows:

The piece manufactured

The environment

Water

It can also occur through a reaction in an electrochemical way. Known factors are the chemical changes of metals from the air, like rust of iron and steel or the formation of green patina on copper and its alloys such as bronze and brass. However, corrosion is a much broader phenomenon that affects all materials such as metals, ceramics, polymers etc, and all environmental factors such as aqueous media, atmosphere, high temperature etc. It is an important industrial problem, it can cause accidents (rupture of a piece) and also represents a significant cost, since it is estimated that every few seconds to dissolve 5 tons of steel in the world, from a few nanometer invisible on each piece but multiplied by the amount of steel in the world, constitute a significant amount (James, 1998).

Corrosion is a field of material science invoking notions of chemistry and physics (physical chemistry). For example, a metal shows an inherent tendency to react with the environment (air, water, soil, etc.). The corrosion process is natural and spontaneous (Books LLC, 2010).

Corrosion in Offshore Oil Platforms

Environment in the offshore can be described as very aggressive and it also emphasizes the special and additional pressure in coating systems for protection of steel structures in an oil platform. Operating an offshore oil platform is difficult and cost incurring. Therefore, it is important to select the quality coating, quality parts of the structure and it is also important to ensure proper implementation of these factors for an oil platform to work effectively and ...