The effect of temperature and hydrodynamics on carbon steel corrosion and its inhibition in oxygenated acid–salt solution

Corrosion of carbon steel in hydrochloric acid (HCl)–sodium sulphate (Na2SO4) solution mixture was investigated using rotating cylinder electrode (RCE) for a range of rotation velocity, 0–2000 rpm, solution temperature of 32–52 °C, and different oxygen concentrations. The corrosion rat was determined by using both weight loss method and electrochemical polarization technique. Different acid and salt concentrations were used ranged from 0.01 to 0.2 M for salt and 0.5 to 5% for acid. The conjoint effect of increased oxygen concentration and high rotational velocity was studied based on experimental measurements of O2 concentration. The effects of operating conditions on indole and cetyl trimethyl ammonium bromides (CTAB) inhibition efficiency were also studied and discussed. The results showed that increasing the rotational velocity leads to an increase in the corrosion rate depending on the concentration of salt and acid. Increasing the temperature and acid concentrations leads to an increase in the corrosion rate while the corrosion rate exhibited unstable trend with salt concentration leads to change of corrosion. It is found that increasing O2 concentration leads to a considerable increase in the corrosion rates especially at high rotational velocity. Indole and CTAB inhibitors exhibited very good inhibition efficiency in most conditions investigated with the former exhibited better inhibition efficiency arriving up to 87% at low rotational velocities. The inhibition efficiency of both inhibitors was found to decrease with increasing velocity. In addition, indole inhibitor reveals excellent inhibition efficiency even at high temperatures while CTAB efficiency decreased appreciably with temperature increase.