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Conductivity Measurements on H2O-Bearing CO2-Rich Fluids

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Abstract

Recent studies report rapid corrosion of metals and carbonation of minerals in contact with carbon dioxide containing trace amounts of dissolved water. One explanation for this behavior is that addition of small amounts of H2O to CO2 leads to significant ionization within the fluid, thus promoting reactions at the fluid–solid interface analogous to corrosion associated with aqueous fluids. The extent of ionization in the bulk CO2 fluid was determined using a flow-through conductivity cell capable of detecting very low conductivities. Experiments were conducted from 298 to 473 K and 7.39 to 20 MPa with H2O concentrations up to ~1,600 ppmw (mole fraction of water, \( x_{{{\text{H}}_2}\text{O}} \) ≈3.9 × 10−3), corresponding to the H2O solubility limit in liquid CO2 at ambient temperature. All solutions showed conductivities <10 nS·cm−1, indicating that the bulk solutions were essentially ion-free. This observation suggests that the observed corrosion and carbonation reactions are not the result of ionization in CO2-rich bulk phase, but does not preclude ionization in the fluid at the fluid–solid interface.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Jacques Pironon and three unnamed reviewers for critical reviews of this manuscript and Matthew Steele-MacInnis for useful discussions and assistance with calculations. This material is based upon work supported as ORNL’s part of the Center for Nanoscale Control of Geologic CO2, an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, managed and operated by UT-Battelle, LLC. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship under Grant No. DGE-0822220. Any opinion, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

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  1. Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, 24061, USA

    Ryan M. Capobianco, Robert J. Bodnar & J. Donald Rimstidt

  2. Chemical Sciences Division, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, MS-6110, P.O. Box 2008, Oak Ridge, TN, 37831-6110, USA

    Miroslaw S. Gruszkiewicz

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  1. Ryan M. Capobianco
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Capobianco, R.M., Gruszkiewicz, M.S., Bodnar, R.J. et al. Conductivity Measurements on H2O-Bearing CO2-Rich Fluids. J Solution Chem 44, 934–962 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10953-014-0219-7

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