Fundamental studies to elucidate the protection mechanism(s) for making intelligent choices of coatings used in oil and gas production

Abstract

Considerable attention has been given by the industries and researchers to develop the organic coating systems because of their importance in protecting and maintaining the integrity of the internal surfaces of oil and gas pipelines against corrosive solutions. Oil and natural gas pipelines mostly encounter both corrosion and wear degradations. The current study focuses on the development of coating systems by incorporating various types and amounts of fillers that are improving its barrier function to ward off the internal pipeline surfaces from the corrosive constituents. Simultaneously, fillers enhance the mechanical property of the coating systems that are capable of resisting a physical wear damage. The coating systems ranged in thickness and with micro to nano-size fillers. The pin-ball wear process, with two loads (100 N and 200 N), were applied on the surfaces of the coating systems. The hardness and reduced Young’s modulus of the coated surfaces were characterized. The effect of the wear process with different loads were evaluated by employing a three dimensions (3D)-image profile-meter. A simulation of the sweet (CO2) and sour (CO2 and H2S) environments, with 2000 ppm Cl- ions, pH 4, at (60 oC and 1 bar), and (100 oC and 100 bar), respectively, used in the oil and gas industry were used to immerse and evaluate the coating systems. The coating system surface topographies, after the exposure to corrosive solutions, were evaluated by the 3-D profile-meter, stereoscope and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The intentional defects imposed on the coating systems were exposed to corrosive solutions and their performance were periodically studied by the electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) technique. The electrochemical actions and coating system degradations due to the exposure to the corrosive solution were studied by the equivalent circuit models. The calculated EIS parameters were used to understand the interactions between the coating systems and corrosive solution. The effect of the high-load wear process was not considerable on the coating systems with significant amount of fillers. The coating systems with high amount of conductive and non-conductive fillers significantly showed high impedance in both the intact coating case and the highest coating resistance in case of the surface with intentional defects. No critical impact of the harsh environment with high pressure and temperature was observed on the powder phenolic Novolac coating system with defects. The harsh corrosive environment (sour), with high pressure and temperature, had a significant impact on most of the coating systems with defects and, specifically, the coating system that had carbon nanotube fillers. Protection and degradation mechanisms of the coating systems have been proposed.