Fick's second law of diffusion is typically used to estimate the corrosion
service life of concrete structures. To use Fick's law, an estimate of the
effective chloride diffusion coefficient is required. Historically, chlorid
e profile test data from hardened concrete were required to estimate chlori
de diffusion coefficients. This paper provides an equation to estimate the
chloride diffusion coefficient from known concrete mixture proportions, and
other easily obtained quantities when test data are not available. This eq
uation was developed by statistical analysis of a database containing chlor
ide diffusion coefficients for concrete obtained from migration tests and h
as the potential for use as an engineering tool for optimizing concrete mix
ture proportions to satisfy corrosion service life design criteria during p
reliminary cost/benefit analysis.