Supporting a Reactor Cleaning Project During Refinery Works

Before cleaning could begin, a soda ash solution needed to be prepared on site and stored in sufficient volume ready to be transferred to the reactors. Once the solution had been used, it then needed to be returned from the reactors and securely contained as waste prior to removal from site, as it could not simply be discharged to sewer.

With the reactors positioned away from the designated tank area, the project also required careful consideration of the tank layout, manifolding and site interfaces.

During the works, TerraTank supplied twenty one of our TT70 bulk storage tanks manifolded together, providing 1,470,000 litres of capacity, consisting of:

• 20 × TT70 bulk storage tanks
• 1 × TT70 open-top mixer tank
• Manifolding, additional valves and associated hose connections

The twenty TT70s were configured in two rows of ten, with each row manifolded at both ends and the tanks balanced together to create a scalable bulk storage system.

The mixer tank provided a dedicated area for preparation of the soda ash solution. Chemicals were introduced from an adjacent mobile platform and circulated through the tank using a pump, before the prepared solution was transferred into the main tank farm.

Once the reactor clean commenced, the stored solution could be pumped from the tanks to the reactors as required. Following use, the liquid was gravity-fed back into the same storage system, with the remaining volume pumped back, allowing the resulting waste stream to be securely contained before being removed from site for disposal.

TerraTank also worked closely around the practical requirements of the site, supporting tank sizing, system layout, site visits and a flexible manifolding arrangement. Additional valves were incorporated into the system to provide further operational flexibility should the customer require it during the project.