Evaluación del comportamiento electroquímico del extracto de nopal (Opuntia Ficus-Indica) como posible inhibidor de corrosión

Abstract

Evaluation of Electrochemical Behavior of Nopal Extract (Opuntia Ficus-Indica) as Possible Corrosion Inhibitor. Corrosion is one of the main problems of degradation in components, tooling, equipment and even in structural applications, examples of this are the carbon steels. In the present work, the capacity of corrosion inhibition of a biodegradable organic extract from the Nopal plant (Opuntia ficus-indica), for the protection of carbon steel type AISI 1018 was studied adding 50% v/v of the Nopal extract (EN) in a solution of H2SO4 (0.6 mol.l-1). Polarization Resistance (LPR) and Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS) techniques were used for the electrochemical evaluation at room temperature for 24 h in order to obtain corrosion rates (Vcorr) and inhibition efficiency (IE). Metallographic examination was also carried out to register the surface damage by corrosion. The results showed a reduction of the Vcorr with a maximum IE value of about 84% by adding the organic-liquid extracted from Nopal.