Can Engineers Effectively Combat Corrosion?
Posted on December 28, 2011
The most current (2002) study of the cost of corrosion in the United States found the associated loss was $276 billion in 1998 – 3.1% of the country’s total Gross Domestic Product that year. The National Association of Corrosion Engineers (NACE International) and the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) jointly coordinated that study.
In 2008 a study by the U.S. Department of Defense indicated the return on investment for corrosion mitigation projects over a three-year period in military applications averaged 50 to 1, i.e., savings-to-mitigation expenditures. Given these data why does corrosion continue to be a major economic sinkhole for private industry and our government?
A 2011 report, entitled “Research Opportunities in Corrosion Science and Engineering”, published by National Academic Press in Washington, D.C. (www.nap.edu) provides important facts and opinions relevant to this question. Some of these results follow:
-Presently corrosion engineering is not a required course in most U.S. undergraduate engineering curriculums. Often such a course is not available at all. This is true even for students in material science and engineering that one might expect would have this as a fundamental area of study.
-Industry and government employers recognize they need employees with competence in corrosion control but the engineering graduates they hire generally don’t. The employers’ main concern is that those making design decisions involving materials and corrosion often lack minimum knowledge necessary to provide resistance to attack. The report notes some employers surveyed said many of their engineers, “don’t know what they don’t know”.
-Employers attempt to solve this problem in two ways. First with on-the-job training (OJT) and short courses on corrosion for engineers and technicians that make critical materials decisions and/or monitor existing equipment for potential failure by corrosion. Outside consulting corrosion experts are also used but, unfortunately, these people are most frequently used as failure analysts after a loss. Their input would be more useful during the early design stage of a project when the opportunity to avoid later costs of litigation or shutdown of in-service equipment would be most effective.
-OJT, short courses and the use of consultants provide stopgap solutions. However, fewer people with corrosion engineering backgrounds are available as in-house mentors, as outside consultants or as short-course trainers. Many of those with this experience are senior engineers that have or soon will retire and, compared to most other engineering disciplines, they were always a small group. Often their replacements are from other disciplines in which little or no training in corrosion was provided.
-The report concludes that stopgap tactical measures must continue by industry and government but strategic progress in corrosion control requires additional actions. These include clearly defining for universities what engineering graduates need in terms of awareness and knowledge of corrosion and providing financial support for corrosion research. The latter is essential to gaining better corrosion control and prediction methods but it has another major benefit. Quality faculty members and students are attracted to well-funded areas in universities. This will eventually result in a larger population of qualified engineering graduates to effectively address corrosion.
