Assessing corrosion in oil refining and petrochemical processing

This paper summarizes the development of an information system used to manage corrosion ofmetals and alloys by high temperature gases found in many different oil refining, petrochemical,power generation, and chemical processes. The database currently represents about 7.9 million h ofexposure time for about 5,500 tests with 89 commercial alloys for a temperature range of 200 –1,200 °C. The system manages corrosion data from well-defined exposures and determines corrosion product stabilities. New models used in the analysis of thermochemical data for the Fe-Ni-CrCo-C-O-S-N-H system are being compiled. All known phases based upon combinations of theelements have been analyzed to allow complete assessments of corrosion product stabilities. Use ofthese data allows prediction of stable corrosion products and hence identification of the possibledominant corrosion mechanisms. The system has the potential to be used in corrosion research, alloydevelopment, failure analysis, lifetime prediction, and process operations evaluations. The corrosionmechanisms emphasized are oxidation, sulfidation, sulfidation/oxidation, and carburization.

Uncontrolled Keywords

oxidation; sulfidation; sulfidation/oxidation; carburization; ASSET; database; hugh temperature corrosion; total metal penetration; engineering lifetime prediction