In-Situ Smart Corrosion Sensors for Water Piping Systems

The objective of this proposal is to design, test and demonstrate an in situ smart sensor for monitoring corrosivity of water in pipelines, and to communicate the data to a controller. We propose to adapt a prototype corrosion sensor on a wireless platform recently developed by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (JHU/APL). Known as the Embeddable Corrosion Rate Monitor (ECRM), this wireless sensor has been successfully tested in concrete, and has the potential to be adapted for monitoring of corrosivity of water pipelines. With this instrument which has built-in internal calibration, we can perform electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) to obtain accurate measurements of uniform corrosion rate and electrolyte resistance and also measure electrochemical noise (EN) that provides information on pitting corrosion. Our vision is to modify the ECRM sensor and make it a fully functional miniature wireless corrosion rate sensor that has an accuracy of 0.01 mil/year. The small-size (1.5-inch-diameter; 4-inch-tall) and wireless aspects of the proposed sensor permit installation of a series of them in water pipelines for effective corrosion monitoring at economical costs.