Cathodic Protection

Cathodic protection (CP) is a technique used to control the corrosion of a metal surface by making it the cathode of an electrochemical cell. The simplest method to apply CP is by connecting the metal to be protected with a piece of another more easily corroded "sacrificial metal" to act as the anode of the electrochemical cell. The sacrificial metal then corrodes instead of the protected metal. For structures where passive galvanic CP is not adequate, for example in long pipelines, an external DC electrical power source is sometimes used to provide current. Cathodic protection systems are used to protect a wide range of metallic structures in various environments. Common applications are; steel water or fuel pipelines and storage tanks such as home water heaters, steel pier piles; ship and boat hulls; offshore oil platforms and onshore oil well casings and metal reinforcement bars in concrete buildings and structures. Another common application is in galvanized steel, in which a sacrificial coating of zinc on steel parts protects them from rust.

Cathodic protection can, in some cases, prevent stress corrosion cracking.