Investigating the effects of environment, corrosion degree, and distribution of corrosive microbial communities on service-life of refined oil pipelines

Abstract

Although the potential corrosive microbial communities of the refined oil pipelines can cause pipeline failure which directly threatens on soil and water environment, few studies have been published in this field. Therefore, the long-distance on-site internal corrosion detection and high-throughput sequencing techniques were employed in this study to investigate the distribution shifts of the corrosive microbial communities on the inner wall of a refined oil pipeline and its impact on the internal corrosion. The microorganisms colonizing on the inner wall of the pipeline showed significant distribution differences between the axial direction of the relative elevation and radial direction of the cross-section. On the inner wall, the high diversity and the abundance of the corrosive microbial communities induced serious microbiologically influenced corrosion (MIC), while the chemical corrosion and the synergy of the corrosive microbial communities accelerated the internal corrosion of the refined oil pipeline. A corrosion zone model has been proposed, which divides the pipeline cross-section into the sediment, the water-oil interface, the gas-oil interface, and the oil fully immersed zones. Therefore, the relationships between the environment, corrosion degree, and distribution characteristics of the corrosive microbial communities in the pipeline were analyzed. This research exhibited the importance of the distribution characteristics of the corrosive microorganisms on the inner wall of the refined oil pipelines. Its internal corrosion behavior was accurately explored, while providing a basis for controlling the corrosive microbial communities.