Influence of temperature on the service life of rebars

Abstract This work analyses the effect of temperature, chloride proportion and degree of humidity in concrete pores (resistivity) on the service life of reinforced concrete structures following the Tuutti qualitative service life, which quantified by means of the acceptance of a limiting value for the cross section reduction of the embedded steel reinforcement. The time needed to reach this limiting value is a function of the corrosion rate. The effect of temperature on the corrosion rate of steel can be accounted for in terms of moisture availability: high temperatures markedly increase the risk of corrosion in moist concrete with chloride, whereas they have the opposite effect on dry or semidry concrete.