Using green corrosion inhibitor to reduce maintenance cost for carbon steel saline water storage systems in the oil industry

Carbon steel has long been used in storing the saline water that results from oil washing in the oil industry. However, a high corrosion rate is reported, resulting in significant economic losses for oil companies. In the Middle East oil field, the temperature touches 50⁰C in Summer, causing increasing in corrosion rate for saline water steel storage tanks and pipes. In the present work, abundantly available wheat straw was used to prepare a cost-effective silicate inhibitor. The high inhibition efficiency of up to 94 % decreased the corrosion rate from severe corrosion for no-inhibitor specimen to close to low corrosion category for optimum inhibitor concentration specimen. The mechanism of the inhibition effect is the formation of a chemically adsorbed layer on the steel surface, which is successfully described by Langmuir isotherm. Additionally, at high concentrations of nano-silica, complex aggregates might form and be physically adsorbed on the surface of steel above the chemically adsorbed nano-silicate monolayer.