Survey of Corrosion Cost in China and Preventive Strategies

A national consultative project entitled "corrosion cost survey in China and preventive strategies" was funded by the Chinese Academy of Engineering in 1998. Soon afterwards, an expert group was organized jointly by the Institute of Metal Research, CAS and Chinese Society of Corrosion and Protection. The report on corrosion cost survey in China was published in 2003. According to this report the overall annual corrosion cost in China estimated by the Uhlig Method and Hoar Method at 1997-2001 was found to be 200.7 billion Yuan RMB and 228.8 billion Yuan RMB respectively, which is equivalent to 2% of the gross national product of China. However the total cost of corrosion including the direct and indirect cost was estimated to be more than 500 billion Yuan RMB per year in China. Among them, corrosion cost of infrastructure ranked in first comparing with other sectors. Although corrosion costs in some sectors, such as electric power, petrochemical, oil pipeline and railway in China has reduced in the past years, significant losses are still being encountered in most sectors of industries and cost-effective methods have not always been implemented. Both successful and unsuccessful cases in corrosion control and corrosion management were collected. As the investment in capital construction continues increasing rapidly in China, the maintenance and life extension of the infrastructures will become a big issue. The preventive strategies have been suggested