A long and proud history
Total Corrosion Solutions joined the MDU Resources Group family of companies in August 2009. TCS is part of Bitter Creek Energy Services, the energy services subsidiary of MDU Resources. TCS strengthens and broadens Bitter Creek’s field energy services portfolio and enhances the company’s ability to design and build innovative solutions for detecting, preventing and controlling corrosion on many different types of buried or submerged metal structures.
TCS is not new to the corrosion-control industry. Its core group of employees has been together for more than 20 years, working exclusively in the corrosion-prevention industry. In 2001, the core group of eight partners purchased the company from their employer and set up the business that would become TCS.
TCS is a full-service corrosion-prevention company specializing in cathodic protection – a common method used to control corrosion. The company designs and installs systems to prevent and control corrosion on metal structures and provides specialized services to detect corrosion and pipeline coating defects. TCS also designs, manufactures and installs solar power systems for remote locations that don’t have access to an electrical power supply.
Primary customers for TCS are oil and natural gas pipeline and production companies that need corrosion control for underground metal pipelines. Other customers include oil transporters, refineries and municipal water utilities. Any entity that depends on buried, submerged or surface-placed metal as a component of their business operation is a potential customer for TCS.
Based in Billings, Mont., the company has approximately 30 employees and works for customers spread out across the Rocky Mountain Region and Pacific Northwest, although Brent Cathey, TCS president, says they will go wherever their customer needs them to be.
“Our competitive advantage is our experienced employees,” Cathey said. “We have been doing this type of work for more than 20 years and there’s not much we haven’t seen or done when it comes to cathodic protection.”
Many TCS employees are accredited by the National Association of Corrosion Engineers. NACE accreditation features various levels of certification depending on work experience and amount and type of classroom training. To achieve the certification, the TCS employees need to take classroom training plus pass a rigorous examination.
Corporate Structure
Total Corrosion Solutions, a division of Bitter Creek Energy Services, is part of the WBI Holdings family of companies which are all indirect wholly owned subsidiaries of MDU Resources Group (NYSE: MDU).
MDU Resources is based in Bismarck, N.D. and is a member of the S&P MidCap 400 index providing value-added natural resource products and related services and operates with three core lines of business: utility resources, energy, and construction materials. WBI Holdings comprises the energy business line for MDU Resources.