Institute News
The Professional assessment Committee (PAC) is responsible for the evaluation and assessment of applications for Professional Membership of the Institute of Corrosion (TICorr, MICorr and FICorr), plus applications for Chartered Scientist and, via the cathodic protection sub-committee, Cathodic Protection Personnel Certification. PAC reports to the Council of ICorr through the Trustees. The committee consists of a Chair and at least 5 other members. The maximum number of all members should not normally exceed 10, and is currently around that size, although new assessors are always welcome. The Chair of PAC is nominated by the ICorr Council.
The members of PAC are expected to be Professional Members of the Institute and to have extensive experience in various disciplines within the corrosion industry or academia. Members of the committee may be nominated by any Professional Member or ICorr Member, and are ultimately appointed by the PAC Chair. The normal term of membership is 4 years, although any member approaching this is eligible for re-nomination. The Chair is also awarded on a 4-year basis, with the option for re-nomination by Council. The PAC’s terms of reference are to assess applications for Professional Membership in compliance with Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (ED&I) requirements, including unconscious bias. All information provided by the applicant is treated with the utmost confidentiality and is not discussed or passed on to any third party in accordance with the Data Protection Regulations. Applications are checked for compliance with the Membership Regulations for education, training, and experience, as appropriate to the grade, and must be accompanied by two references, at least one of which must be from a Professional Member of the Institute. In exceptional circumstances, appropriately certificated and qualified members of other bodies may be acceptable at the discretion of the Chair.
Applications for Professional Membership are sent to 3 members of the PAC Committee (providing they are not also acting as a referee) for assessment and recommendation of suitability for Professional Membership at the grade appropriate to their experience. Where unanimous approval is not received, the PAC Chair adjudicates (with the assistance of the President if considered necessary) and recommends whatever action or consultation is considered appropriate. This may involve the arrangement of a meeting (currently on-line or by telephone, but face-to-face whenever possible) to discuss the candidate’s application and address any concerns that may have been identified by the Professional Assessors. The PAC Chair prepares a report of approved applications for presentation and approval by Council, circulated ahead of Council Meetings, and on approval, the appropriate Certificates are signed by the President and sent to the successful applicant. Successful candidates are announced in Corrosion Management, normally in the January/February issue, unless requested otherwise. The members of PAC only meet, either in person or on-line, at the discretion of the Chair. In general, communication is carried out by email or post, with the applicant’s files only retained for record purposes at Head Office. All applicant’s information and assessments are treated as confidential and held in the Member file in Head Office, and retained for up to 5 years upon leaving the Institute.
The procedures employed by the PAC, together with the Membership Regulations, are reviewed every 12 months and updated as required, following discussions with the Professional Assessors and President and subject to their approval.
The current PAC Chair is Paul Lambert, and there is a recently introduced Vice-Chair position that is currently vacant. Anyone who is interested in joining the PAC as a Professional Assessor should contact Paul via email on pac.chair@icorr.org
Institute News
On February 1st, the President of the Institute of Corrosion (ICorr), Stephen Tate, met with Chris Kirby, Advisor, and ICorr Training Manager, Dale O’Reilly, of IMechE Argyll Ruane (IAR), to officially sign a further ten-year partnership agreement between the Institute of Corrosion and IMechE Argyll Ruane, for training course delivery.
The ICorr scheme is undergoing a period of rapid expansion, with significant investment being made by both ICorr and IAR to enhance their service provision. The revised partnership agreement demonstrates a further commitment to this collaborative approach, utilising the knowledge and skills across both organisations to further develop the course content, systems, and processes, to ensure the very best training courses are provided to corrosion clients around the world.
IMechE Argyll Ruane have been delivering corrosion and coatings inspection training courses, and examinations accredited by the Institute of Corrosion for over 20 years, and have supported the expansion of the ICorr certification scheme around the globe by forming partnerships with key organisations to be able in future to provide classroom and online training in the UK, Europe, Turkey, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, North Africa, the Middle East, and Australia.
Chris Kirby and President of ICorr, Stephen Tate, signing new 10-year partnership agreement.
The partnership enables both organisations to push forward with their strategic objectives of achieving:
• A greater provision to offer online and blended approaches for courses – enabling greater flexibility in course offering, and supporting an industry desire to keep the face-to-face element of the course compact, effectively utilising contact time with the trainer whilst maintaining the high quality of the course content. For example, candidates will soon be able to complete online elements for courses such as Level 2 Insulation Inspector and Passive Fire Protection (PFP) Inspector, prior to attending the course.
• A commitment to standardising course requirements/syllabi – implementing new protocols and continual improvement processes for the development of new, and the reviewing of current, course syllabi, ensuring clients receive the highest standard of training courses to meet the changing requirements of industry.
• An ability to partner with a greater number of organisations – aligning with the Institute of Corrosion’s vision of expanding the global influence of the ICorr certification scheme.
Chris Kirby Advisor, President of ICorr Stephen Tate, and IMechE Argyll Ruane ICorr Manager Dale O’Reilly.
For more information about ICorr training courses delivered by IMechE Argyll Ruane and their training partners, please visit: argyllruane.imeche.org/coatings-corrosion
For further information about the ICorr schemes in general, please visit https://www.icorr.org/training-qualifications/
Institute News
Welcome to the Spring edition of the magazine. As you will see from the above President’s column, the magazine now has a new editor, who I am sure will continue to meet the needs of the members with topical columns and technical articles.
This issue contains a very extensive report on what your Institute has been doing over the last couple of months, as well as the usual columns and technical articles. These articles cover the problems associated with galvanic corrosion of wells in the Middle East, and a very instructive look at the problems of scale formation and associated corrosion.
As I said previously in my column, I have enjoyed editing this magazine, although difficult at times, and I am now going to enjoy relaxing in the “sun” in south London. I wish you all success in your careers in this fascinating industry.
Brian Goldie
Consulting Editor
Institute News
Welcome to the 2nd issue of our Magazine for 2023. A new editor has now been appointed, Dr Shagufta Khan FICorr, and to give her time to settle into the role, Brian Goldie, the outgoing editor, has very kindly agreed to stay in position for this issue. The May/June issue will be Shagufta’s first as editor, and Brian will assist her for the first two issues. Thank you to Brian for so much hard work and many congratulations to Shagufta, who may be contacted at: editor@icorr.org, if you have any news or technical articles to submit.
It has been a busy year so far, with a number of events having taken place already amongst our various Branches and Divisions.
After extensive discussions between Bill Hedges, John Fletcher, myself, and representatives of IMechE, l am delighted to say the new 10yr ICorr/IAR Training agreement was signed on 6th January 2023 by both parties, see later in this issue.
The Birmingham 1-Day conference on February 9th brought together many of our ICorr award winners, several of our sustaining companies and training providers, for some truly excellent presentations in the splendid setting of the City Chambers. A report on this can be found in the local branch news section.
Another development, now approved by Council, is the new Yong ICorr 8-week summer internship, established in honour of Professor Anne Neville, who sadly passed away in 2022. This new scheme commencing in 2024, will provide the opportunity for undergraduate students to experience corrosion research, initially in the Institute of Functional Surfaces, University of Leeds, under the supervision of Dr Joshua Owen and Prof Richard Barker, thereafter rotating to other Universities. The internship aims to inspire high achieving undergraduate students into careers in the field of corrosion.
Finally, but not least, we are looking to investigate, and fully research in Q2, whether a direct ICorr CEng offering can be progressed over the short to medium term. It is believed that (resources/volunteers permitting) ICorr CEng Direct would form a key element of ICorr membership growth going forwards, and would give greater prestige to the Institute, and help retain our existing members. It is proposed that a sub-committee of PAC be established under Vice President Yunnan Gao, working alongside David Harvey and Anthony Setiadi. Also aligned to our goals has been the recent work of our ICorr Awards Committee, with preparation of nominations of ICorr members for CSD, EFC and IOM3 awards currently ongoing.
Nick Smart, after several years of service has now stepped down from the committee. The new CED chair, Danny Burkle, has kindly volunteered to take up these duties, and we welcome him on board. We offer our thanks to Nick whose past support is highly appreciated.
A reminder that April 27th will take us to the Annual CED Working Day event at NPL Teddington, entitled ‘Corrosion Prevention in the 21st Century: Learning from the Past to protect the Future’, and June 22nd and 23rd will feature our main 2-day Sustainability and Renewables conference for NE Branch. August 29th will again see Aberdeen host its well-respected annual 1-day Corrosion Awareness event. For all events, please check regularly:
https://www.icorr.org/events/month/2023-04/
Please contact me on any aspect of the Institute’s work at: president@icorr.org
For anyone who has not yet renewed their membership, do please liaise with Institute of Corrosion HQ, at admin@icorr.org, who will be happy to help you, especially if your contact details have recently changed.
With my very best wishes to you all.
Stephen Tate
President: Institute of Corrosion
Institute News, Midlands Branch
The Institute is very pleased to announce the appointment of Bill Whittaker to the Chair of ICorr Midlands Branch.
Bill brings a wealth of experience to the role and will be a great asset to our Organisation.
Presently a Cathodic Protection Engineer with Cathodic Protection Engineering Ltd (CPEL), Bill started in the corrosion industry in 2005 as a technician and over time progressed into engineering.
Following a brief stint offshore, Bill’s expertise is with Cathodic Protection of onshore pipelines and near shore structures. He has an active involvement in ICORR CP training activities being a member of the CP governing board and the training CP scheme manager. Bill holds an MSc in Corrosion Control Engineering awarded by Manchester University, is ICorr Level 4 certified (buried and marine sectors) and is also AMPP (formally NACE) CP4 certified.
We welcome Bill to the role and express our thanks at this time to the Midlands branch committee and recent past chairs Ashley Ingram and Paul Segers, who have all given their time freely to ICorr.
Bill may be contacted at: midlandschair@icorr.org
Institute News
The Institute of Corrosion is very sad to announce the passing of Dr Michael John Graham FICorr, on August 2nd 2022, at the age of 82.
Over Michael’s long research career, he published more than 250 papers on his work in corrosion science and engineering, including thin oxide film formation on metals and semiconductors, surface passivation, high temperature oxidation, and the application of surface analytical techniques to degradation of materials. The outstanding nature of his work was recognised by the Institute through the receipt of both the U. R. Evans Award (1994) and the T. P. Hoar Award (1983). He was made a Fellow of the Institute in 1984.
Michael had a distinguished 36 year career at the National Research Council of Canada, starting as a Post-Doctoral Fellow and retiring in 2005 as a Researcher Emeritus. In addition to his ICorr awards, he received the W. R. Whitney Award (2003) and the H. H. Uhlig Award (1997) from NACE, and was Chair of the International Corrosion Council (1996), Chair of the Gordon Research Conference on Corrosion (1985), Co-chair of the 9th International Congress on Metallic Corrosion (1984), and Fellow of NACE (1994).
His leadership responsibilities at the National Research Council of Canada included, Head of Metallic Corrosion and Oxidation, Head of Chemical Characterisation, Head of Surfaces and Interfaces, and Chemistry Division representative to NRC-wide planning and management committees.
He will be particularly remembered for his love of the Gordon Research Conferences on corrosion where he was an active participant in the science and recreational aspects of all but one conference over 47 years. He will be remembered for his sharp mind, determination, fairmindedness, soft-spoken nature, and genuine kindness.
In addition to his love for research in surface science, he was an avid golfer, captained his cricket club in Ottawa,
and played bridge nearly weekly with close friends for over 40 years. Michael was educated at the Creighton School, Carlisle, and the University of Liverpool (B.Sc. with Distinction, 1961; Honours Chemistry, 1962, Ph.D., Surface Chemistry, 1965). In 1998, he was awarded the Honorary Degree of D.Sc. for his contributions to science. He was also a proud recipient of the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Medal (2002).
Michael is survived by his wife and best friend of many years, Lynda Pilkington, his daughter, Karen Lavallee, his sons, John and Andrew, and the mother of his children, Marion Payne.
Adapted from: The Electrochemical Society Interface
31 45 – Winter 2022, www.electrochem.org
