Corrosion of Reinforced Concrete and Its Protection

Abstract

Concrete is used as construction material in the form of plain or reinforced concrete through out the world. It has to withstand the physical, chemical and environmental effects for fulfilling the durability characteristics. The environmental changes due to pollution, lack of main-tenance, poor quality of work, lack of supervision, use of defective materials etc have also taken a heavy toll of concrete structures. Among various factors affecting the reinforced concrete structures the atmosphere, water, salts are most common factors which play a key role for reinforcement corrosion. The damage due to corrosion is a serious effect upon the mechanical properties of concrete structures. Once the corrosion of reinforcement starts due to formation of oxide and if the structure is under load, the stress act-ing on it increases. In such case the ultimate tensile stress (UTS) exceeds and finally the structure fails. The present paper highlights the corrosion of rein-forced concrete structures, factors influencing corrosion of reinforcement, and its remedial measures to some extent.