Toward protection of desalination steel structure from corrosion in harsh marine environment by magnetite-chitosan epoxy nanocomposite.

Although the desalination sector uses carbon steel extensively, it is crucial to put in place efficient anti-corrosion methods to shield these parts from the hazardous sea environment. In the current work, the magnetite-chitosan nanocomposite (MCS) was used to enhance the anti-corrosion durability of an epoxy resin coating for carbon steel in the desalination harsh marine environment. Magnetite and chitosan, a biopolymer derived from chitin, are combined to form a nanocomposite with promising anti-corrosion properties. The co-precipitation technique is utilized to synthesize MCS nanocomposite. X-ray diffraction (XRD), Transmission electron microscopy (TEM), dispersive light scattering (DLS), FT-IR and energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) determine the morphology of MCS. Electrochemical and surface investigations assess and compare the anti-corrosion capabilities of the epoxy/MCS coatings to pure epoxy coating in desalination harsh marine environment. The epoxy/MCS coating results in a 98.7 % decrease in corrosion current density. According to electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), the epoxy/MCS coating has much better anti-corrosion capabilities than neat epoxy and epoxy/magnetite because it displays a substantially bigger capacitive semi-circle. The remarkable mechanical properties of the epoxy/MCS coating are indicated by its significant values of scratch hardness, and impact strength. Epoxy/MCS coating improved pull-off adhesion performance from 3.4 MPa to 7.9 MPa.