Effect of heat treatment on H2S corrosion of a micro-alloyed C–Mn steel

The H2S corrosion resistance of a C–Mn pipeline steel with three different microstructures has been evaluated using electrochemical techniques with a 3% wt. NaCl solution at 50 °C. Microstructures included martensite, ferrite, and ferrite + bainite. Electrochemical techniques included potenthiodynamic polarization curves, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), linear polarization resistance (LPR), and electrochemical noise (EN) measurements. Most of the tests lasted 24 h. All techniques showed that the highest corrosion rate corresponded to the steel with a martensitic microstructure; up to one order of magnitude higher than the corrosion rate for steels with a ferritic + bainitiic microstructure, whereas the steel with the ferritic microstructure showed the lowest corrosion rate. EIS tests showed that the corrosion process was under charge transfer control, whereas EN results indicated that the three steels exhibited a clear tendency towards a localized type of corrosion. However, for longer immersion times, the steel with a martensitic microstructure tended to exhibit a mixture of uniform and localized attack. Results were discussed in terms of grain size, grain boundary energy, amount and distribution of particles found in each steel.