Analysis of the Physicochemical, Mechanical, and Electrochemical Parameters and Their Impact on the Internal and External SCC of Carbon Steel Pipelines
Open Access
- 17 December 2020
- Vol. 13 (24), 5771
- https://doi.org/10.3390/ma13245771
Abstract
The review presented herein is regarding the stress corrosion cracking (SCC) phenomena of carbon steel pipelines affected by the corrosive electrolytes that comes from external (E) and internal (I) environments, as well as the susceptibility and tensile stress on the SCC. Some useful tools are presented including essential aspects for determining and describing the E-SCC and I-SCC in oil and gas pipelines. Therefore, this study aims to present a comprehensive and critical review of a brief experimental summary, and a comparison of physicochemical, mechanical, and electrochemical data affecting external and internal SCC in carbon steel pipelines exposed to corrosive media have been conducted. The SCC, hydrogen-induced cracking (HIC), hydrogen embrittlement, and sulfide stress cracking (SSC) are attributed to the pH, and to hydrogen becoming more corrosive by combining external and internal sources promoting cracking, such as sulfide compounds, acidic soils, acidic atmospheric compounds, hydrochloric acid, sulfuric acid, sodium hydroxide, organic acids (acetic acid, mainly), bacteria induced corrosion, cathodic polarization, among others. SCC growth is a reaction between the microstructural, chemical, and mechanical effects and it depends on the external and internal environmental sources promoting unpredictable cracks and fractures. In some cases, E-SCC could be initiated by hydrogen that comes from the over-voltage during the cathodic protection processes. I-SCC could be activated by over-operating pressure and temperature at flowing media during the production, gathering, storage and transportation of wet hydrocarbons through pipelines. The mechanical properties related to I-SCC were higher in comparison with those reviewed by E-SCC, suggesting that pipelines suffer more susceptibility to I-SCC. When a pipeline is designed, the internal fluid being transported (changes of environments) and the external environment concerning SCC should be considered. This review offers a good starting point for newcomers into the field, it is written as a tutorial, and covers a large number of basic standards in the area.Keywords
This publication has 117 references indexed in Scilit:
- 3D cohesive modelling of hydrogen embrittlement in the heat affected zone of an X70 pipeline steelInternational Journal of Hydrogen Energy, 2013
- A Numerical Corrosion Rate Prediction Method for Direct Assessment of Wet Gas Gathering Pipelines Internal CorrosionEnergies, 2012
- Effect of bainitic microstructure on the susceptibility of pipeline steels to hydrogen induced crackingMaterials Science and Engineering: A, 2011
- Nondestructive characterization of microstructures and determination of elastic properties in plain carbon steel using ultrasonic measurementsMaterials Science and Engineering: A, 2010
- On the Estimation of Failure Rates of Multiple Pipeline SystemsJournal of Pressure Vessel Technology, 2008
- Stress corrosion cracking of API X-60 pipeline in a soil containing waterMaterials Science and Engineering: A, 2006
- Detection and differentiation between cracking processes based on electrochemical and mechanical measurementsElectrochimica Acta, 2004
- Corrosion inhibition of pipeline steel grade API 5L X52 immersed in a 1 M H2SO4 aqueous solution using heterocyclic organic moleculesElectrochimica Acta, 2004
- Damage tolerance approach for probabilistic pitting corrosion fatigue life predictionEngineering Fracture Mechanics, 2001
- Stress corrosion cracking of high-pressure gas transmission pipelinesInternational Journal of Materials in Engineering Applications, 1978