Institut Francais Du Pe'trole

Cnrs

Ondeo Services

Ifremer

Dominique Festy

Bernard Tribollet

Rémy Marchal

Isabelle Frateur

Delphine Herbert-Guillou

Nicolas Monfort-Moros

Laurent Kiene

The invention concerns a sensor and a method for detecting microbiologically induced corrosion in a metal structure, which consists in performing the following steps: providing a sensor comprising at least a first circular electrode () and a ring-shaped electrode () concentric with the first electrode, proximate to the structure () in contact with a corrosive medium; imparting for a time interval t a conditioning current between the two electrodes so as to initiate corrosion, the current being such that the central electrode is cathode and the ring-shaped electrode is anode; after the time interval t, coupling the two electrodes and measuring the current between the two electrodes; calculating the speed of corrosion from the measurement.

Method and device for detecting microbiologically induced corrosion

A method for determining the thickness of a biofilm which is developed on a support which is immersed in an aqueous medium in which a biofilm develops, characterized in that it consists in the following: a) the medium is continuously circulated in an electrochemical cell comprising a reference electrode, an auxiliary electrode and at least one working electrode, b) circulation of said medium is interrupted and the cell is isolated; c) an electrochemical tracer is introduced into the medium present in the cell; d) the medium/tracer solution is circulated in the cell in order to direct a jet of said solution, perpendicular to the working electrode; e) the value of the tracer reduction limiting current is measured and recorded according to the hydrodynamic conditions on the surface of the working electrode; and f) the thickness of the porous layer of biofilm on the surface of the electrode is calculated according to the Koutecky-Levich relation, based on analysis of the transport of material through the porous layer which links the value of the tracer reduction limiting current to the solution flow.

Method and device for detecting a biofilm

Growing community of inventors

Saint-Renan, France

Dominique Festy