Corrosion Inhibitors in the Presence of Elemental Sulfur

Recent work has addressed some of the principal properties of corrosion inhibitors and how these properties impact the ultimate fate of an inhibitor in a production system. Specifically, affinities of various corrosion inhibitors for sand, iron sulfide, barium sulfate, iron carbonate and emulsion drop surfaces were presented. This paper will report the behaviors and performance of selected corrosion inhibitors in the presence of elemental sulfur. The knowledge will help us gain a better understanding of how corrosion inhibitors work in the presence of elemental sulfur and thus allowing us to design the next generation of corrosion inhibitors that effectively inhibited corrosion in high sour system containing elemental sulfur.    The following work will explore corrosion inhibitor’s adsorption characteristic to elemental sulfur, the ability of corrosion inhibitors to mitigate corrosion under elemental sulfur and finally the potential of corrosion inhibitors disperse elemental sulfur into an aqueous phase.