Beneficial Role Of Surfactants in Petroleum Applications

Surface-active agents, surfactants, are widely used and find a very large number of applications in the petroleum industry. This is attributed to their remarkable ability to influence the properties of surfaces and interfaces. Recently, one of the most important applications of surfactants is as effective corrosion inhibitors in the oil industry One of the major consumers of corrosion inhibitors is the oil industry, where they are employed to reduce the corrosion rate of different types of steel alloys in gas and oil well equipment. Both general and localized corrosion are encountered in this industry. Demulsifiers are a class of surfactants used to destabilize emulsions.This destabilization is achieved by reducing the interfacial tension at the emulsion interface. Corrosion collectively with mechanical cyclic loading causes corrosion fatigue which results in major drill string premature failure. It is an extreme cause of concern for those in drilling business