Page 129 - Challenges in Corrosion Costs Causes Consequences and Control(2015)

DATA COLLECTION AND ECONOMIC ANALYSIS 107

TABLE 2.6 Capital and Maintenance Costs
Category Total Capital ($× billion) Maintenance Cost ($× billion)
Aircraft 195 0.99
Ships 56 0.40
Buildings and Real estate 144 0.655
Total 395 2.045

1. The cost of built-in corrosion protection included in the purchase price of
the car.
2. The portion of maintenance and operating costs attributable to corrosion.
3. The cost of premature replacement of automobiles because of corrosion.

The built-in costs of corrosion of automobiles were identified as corrosion protec-
tion for steel body panels such as metallic zinc coatings, paint, adhesives and sealants,
nonferrous metals, corrosion-resistant materials, rust-proofing heat exchanger com-
ponents, mufflers, and tail pipe corrosion. The greatest impact on the cost of corrosion
for automobiles was the adverse effect of corrosion on the cost of replacement of the
automobile. Both the IO model and focused sector study showed that in both models
the cost of replacement of the automobiles dominated the total cost and avoidable
cost estimation.

2.2.4.2.3 The Electric Power Industry The total corrosion costs in the electric
power industry in the generation and distribution of power were estimated to be
$4 billion and the corrosion-related expenditure was estimated at $1.1 billion. A
significant portion of excess capacity of power plants was attributed to corrosion,
where corrosion-related excess capacity was assumed to be approximately 10% of
the total capital investment.
The two main segments of the electric power industry are: (i) generation and (ii)
transmission/distribution of electricity. The five types of plants are fossil fuel, hydro-
electric, nuclear, geothermal, and solar. Corrosion costs varied depending on the type
of the plant. It was found that corrosion greatly increased the frequency and dura-
tion of outages, resulting in significant costs. For the transmission and distribution
of electricity, atmospheric corrosion, and underground corrosion of buried structures
were found to be primary contributors to corrosion costs.
The output of the Battelle-NBS analysis was used to estimate the additional energy
and materials consumed because of metallic corrosion. Approximately 3.4% of the
country’s energy consumption ($1.4 billion) was related to corrosion. Within the
energy sector, the impact of corrosion was greater on coal usage than on petroleum
or natural gas usage. Nearly 0.6% of energy consumption or 0.23 billion dollars was
estimated as avoidable. Nearly 17% of the nation’s demand for metallic ores ($1.4
billion) resulted from corrosion and about one-eighth of that (2.1%) of metallic ore
demand or $180 million was judged to be avoidable. The accomplishments of the
Battelle-NBS study are the following: