Cathodic Protection of the Steel Structures in the Water Treatment Line of a Combined Heat and Power Plant

The products of corrosion of steel structures with various sacrificial anode materials in acidic and alkaline environments are studied. Zinc is shown to be the best material for the cathodic protection of neutralization tanks in the solutions under study. However, the dissolution rate of a zinc anode in acidic solutions is significantly higher than in alkaline and neutral ones, which leads to both significant contamination of water with zinc corrosion products and to the need for rapid replacement of zinc. Technological solutions to weaken this effect are proposed. A promising type of anode is shown to be a porous anode, which allowed us to decrease the fraction of anode overpotential by increasing the surface area. If the pores of such an anode are filled with an inhibitor, cathodic protection can be combined with inhibition of the corrosion process. A method for filling a porous anode (vacuum impregnation) is proposed.