Epoxy/Nickel Ferrite Nanocomposite Coatings: Preparation and Evaluation as Corrosion Inhibitor for Oil Storage Tanks

Abstract

Nickel ferrite NPs (NiFe2O4) was synthesized using gel method, added to epoxy resin coatings by three percentages as a corrosion inhibitor for carbon steel used in oil derivatives storage tanks. X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), in addition to field emission-scanning electron microscopy/ Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (FE-SEM/ EDS) were used to characterize the synthesized Ni ferrite NPs and epoxy/ Ni ferrite nanocomposite coatings. The findings confirmed that NiFe2O4 with structure of inverse spinel type was successfully prepared and uniformly distributed in the epoxy resin. The effect of Ni ferrite NPs on the corrosion protection ability of the epoxy-based coatings was investigated using Tafel extrapolation curves after 12 days of immersion in the corrosive solution produced from crude oil. The epoxy/ 0.5wt.% Ni ferrite exhibited the maximum protection efficiency 91.36%, which revealed the improvement of anti-corrosion coatings for carbon steel as compared to conventional epoxy, whose corrosion inhibition efficiency was 32.48 %.