The
feasibility study of utilizing sunflower oil as renewable biomass
source to develop highly effective inhibitors for mild steel corrosion
(MS) in the 15% HCl medium was done by weight loss, potentiodynamic
polarization (PDP), dynamic electrochemical impedance spectroscopy
(DEIS), and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), supported
with energy-dispersive X-ray (EDX), atomic force microscopy (AFM),
and field-emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM) techniques.
Moreover, a complementary theoretical investigation was carried out
to clarify the inhibition mechanism of inhibitors by density functional
theory (DFT), density functional based tight-binding (DFTB), and molecular
dynamics (MD) simulation approaches. The obtained results confirm
that sunflower-oil-based corrosion inhibitor (SFOCI) has a significant
anticorrosion property toward the dissolution of MS in 15% HCl solution
in the temperature range 20–80 °C. In addition, the results
show that SFOCI could provide an inhibition efficiency of 98 and 93%
at 60 and 80 °C, respectively. The inhibition mechanism of SFOCIs
was mixed-type and their adsorption on the surface of MS was mainly
chemisorption. The FESEM and EDX studies proved the presence of SFOCI
molecules on the surface of MS. In addition, the adsorption energy
of SFOCI indicated an intense interaction between the inhibitor and
surface of Fe. The results of this study could open a new window for
the design and development of scalable and effective eco-friendly
vegetable-oil-based corrosion inhibitors for highly corrosive solutions
at high temperatures.