Search results

The present paper consists of an outline of the analysis of corrosion reactions made possible by the use of the concepts of chemical and electrochemical affinities and of the principles of equilibrium thermodynamics and of the thermodynamics of irreversible processes. For the essentials of the thermodynamic theory of affinity the reader is referred to the books of De Bonder and Van Rysselberghe and of Prigogine and Defay and, for the essentials of the thermodynamic theory of electrochemical affinity, he is referred to an article and a monograph by Van Rysselberghe We shall base our whole presentation on a typical example, that of metallic zinc undergoing corrosion in aqueous media. Generalisation to other cases can readily be worked out.