[ End User Interview ]
[ End User Interview ]
From corrosion specialist to technical leader
With a career spanning corrosion control, materials engineering, and integrity management at Petroleum Development Oman, Material & Integrity Manager Dr Talal Al Nabhani has developed a deep, practical understanding of material behaviour in some of the industry’ s most aggressive environments. His experience in selecting and managing stainless steels, duplex grades and high-alloy CRAs underpins a broader approach that balances corrosion resistance, operability and lifecycle cost.
By Joanne McIntyre, Stainless Steel World
After completing his secondary education, Dr Nabhani joined Petroleum Development Oman( PDO) through a scholarship programme. He moved to the UK to study A-level physics, chemistry and mathematics, before enrolling at Teesside University. There, he earned a Bachelor’ s degree in Chemical Engineering. He joined the University of Manchester for a Master’ s degree in corrosion control, later completing a PhD focused on hydrogen permeation and its impact on material performance in aggressive environments.“ That’ s where the fun started,” he recalls, marking the point at which corrosion control became central to his career. Returning to PDO in 2007, Dr Nabhani began as a corrosion control engineer, gaining hands-on experience across pipelines, tanks, coatings, corrosion inhibitors and monitoring systems.“ We were very focused on understanding corrosion mechanisms and ensuring effective mitigation strategies,” he explains. Alongside this, he worked on corrosion monitoring technologies such as coupons, Microcore screens and Linear polarisation Resistance( LBR), building a strong foundation that combined theoretical knowledge with operational practice. In 2009, he transitioned into a broader materials and corrosion engineering role, taking on responsibilities across material selection, coating systems, cathodic protection design and failure investigations. His work also included corrosion inhibitor qualification and vendor audits, exposing him to the full lifecycle of materials engineering, from design through to operation.
Balancing cost, performance, reliability A key milestone came with Dr Nabhani’ s involvement in the Rabab Harweel Integrated Project, a USD 4.5 billion development project. As Lead Materials and Corrosion Engineer, Dr Nabhani defined material selection strategies in a high-sour, high-chloride environment.“ We had to carefully balance cost with longterm performance and reliability,” he says. The project required a mix of carbon steel, corrosion-resistant alloys and non-metallic materials, each with inherent limitations.“ In
PDO’ s Saih Rawl Depletion Compression Project( CPP) in Central Oman is a critical infrastructure development designed to maintain gas export capacity. Photo: Photo © PDO