An Internet of Things Based Cathodic Protection System for Buried Pipeline in Basra/Iraq

Abstract

Petroleum has become the main nerve of the global economy. The most important way of transporting petroleum materials is by the pipeline due to its flexibility and ability to transport these materials continuously across tens of hundreds of kilometers with rapidly flow. There are many potential risks when pumping petroleum into pipelines as a dilemma of corrosion, whereas the pipelines are corroded as a result of chemical reactions (between the metal and its surrounding electrons) accompanied by flow electrons (i.e. flow of electric current). This corrosion leads to the destruction of pipelines, loss of working hours, a decrease in production and an increase in actual losses. This research aims to proposed an Impressed Current Cathodic Protection (ICCP) control system that is applied to protect a section of underground buried oil pipeline in Basra/Iraq from corrosion by enforcing current equivalent to the self-generated current between the soil and the metal to make the (metal to be protected) as a cathode. This system has a buck DC-TO-DC converter to provide a variable DC voltage. The output voltage of the buck converter is controlled by Wi-Fi Microcontroller (Wi-Fi MC) using (Proportional–Integral–Derivative) PID controller. The user can monitor the cathodic protection parameters wirelessly using Internet of Things (IoT) technique or in the field via display screen.