Research on corrosion rate assessment of buried pipelines under dynamic metro stray current

Abstract

To provide a reference for the evaluation of corrosion rate under dynamic metro stray current, both simulated experiments in laboratory and coupon tests in the field were conducted to explore the corrosion behavior and the relationship between corrosion rates and dynamic DC interference parameters of buried pipelines. The results show that the dynamic period has a significant influence on the corrosion rate and the ratio of actual corrosion rate to the theoretical corrosion rate. The statistical data of pipe to soil potentials or current densities of coupons electrically connected to pipelines obtained from the field in many cities of China show that the dynamic fluctuation periods under metro stray current are within the range of 0–300 s, among which the majority of fluctuation periods distribute from 50 to 200 s. The dynamic fluctuation of pipe to soil potentials and current densities of coupons exhibits symmetric or asymmetric characteristics. Under the situation of symmetric positive and negative current density, the ratio of the actual corrosion rate to the theoretical corrosion rate ranges from about 4% to 22% under the typical dynamic periods range from 50 to 200 s based on the simulated experiments results in the laboratory. Besides, two corrosion rate assessment methods, including the positive shifting and time ratios of off‐potentials and symmetrical or asymmetric characteristics of DC current density of coupons were proposed. In addition, the evaluation of the on‐potential criteria to assess the corrosion risk of time‐variant anodic interference was also discussed in the paper.