Corrosion of Low-Carbon Steel in a Flow of Phosphoric Acid Solution Containing Iron(III) Phosphate

Theoretical aspects of low-carbon steel corrosion in H3PO4 solutions containing FePO4 are considered. In the system under study, reactions of iron with the acid solution and Fe(III) salt are thermodynamically allowed. The oxidizing power of this medium, characterized by the Fe(III)/Fe(II) couple redox potential, is mainly determined by its anionic composition. Phosphate anions of a corrosive medium bind Fe(III) cations into complex compounds, reducing their oxidizing ability. In H3PO4 solutions containing FePO4 and Fe3(PO4)2, the dependence of the system’s redox potential on the Fe(III) and Fe(II) cation relative content is poorly described by the Nernst equation, which is due to the nonequivalent complex formation of these cations with phosphate anions. Analysis of the effect of the studied media convection on the low-carbon steel electrode reactions allowed revealing some of their features. In a FePO4-containing H3PO4 solution, kinetically controlled partial reactions of iron anodic ionization and H+ cathodic reduction, as well as diffusion-controlled Fe(III) cation cathodic reduction, occur on the steel. The FePO4 accelerating effect on the steel corrosion in H3PO4 solution is due only to the Fe(III) reduction but does not affect the H+ reduction and the iron ionization. The value of the Fe(III)-cation diffusion coefficient in the studied corrosive medium was experimentally determined from the data of cyclic voltammetry of the Pt electrode therein and the results of the studying of the cathodic reaction of a steel disk electrode at different rotation velocities. The data on the low-carbon steel corrosion in the flow of the studied media, obtained from the metal samples mass loss, are in full agreement with the results of the study of the electrode partial reactions. An accelerating effect of FePO4 on the steel corrosion in H3PO4 solutions is observed. In this environment, steel corrosion is determined by the convective factor, which is typical of processes with diffusion control. The empirical dependence of the steel corrosion rate on the medium flow intensity is described by the linear dependence k = kst + λw1/2, where kst is the steel corrosion rate in a static medium, w is the rotation velocity of the propeller stirrer that creates the medium flow, λ is the empirical coefficient.