Oil Flux Americas
Oil Flux Americas
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Tanks & Tankers

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MSDS - Material Safety Data Sheet reports

BTI
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The produced crude oil in motion from the Exploration & Production “E&P” extraction well to the refinery must be kept moving when its chemical nature causes it to slow down, clog, corrode, leak and settle down into an unmanageable mass in pipelines, storage tanks and transportation facilities like trucks, rail, and sea tankers.

Crude oil storage tanks in “Hubs” and “E&P site Tank Batteries”, and transportation tankers of all types such as sea, rail, and truck (pipelines are also addressed in the Technical analysis for completeness but are also covered in the pipeline section of OilFlux™ products types) can have a variety of issues to keep the crude oil mass flowing free of water and separated from non-crude oil debris. OilFlux™ products BTI, BFO, BVM, WPF, WAS, SWO and W20 are recommended for use in managing the water-free flow of crude oil and cleaning crude oil in and through tanks and tankers, and recuperation and 100% recovery of all crude oil which has settled and coagulated into a mass in the bottoms of the tanks and tankers (or inhibited the flow in pipelines).

Crude oil in storage tanks, truck, rail and sea tankers is reclaimed by manual “man entry” cleaning and by using mechanical methods “non-man entry cleaning” using water, or in the case of sea tankers also Crude Oil Washing “COW”, with and without formulated specialty chemical additives. While crude oil can be reclaimed by these various methods, substantial amounts of crude oil remain encapsulated in the oily debris which is sent onto “recyclers” for additional recovery. The OilFlux™ products BTI, BFO, BVM, WPF, WAS, SWO and W20 are specially formulated to recover virtually 100% of the crude oil directly from tank bottoms without subsequent additional treatment and recycling.

In just the continental USA, for example, (not including Canada and Mexico) …

  • sea tankers numbering about 4,295 (CIA projection) carry about 23% of USA domestic and imported crude equaling about 12.0 mm bbl/d in 10,000 DWT GPT to 550,000 DWT MRT/LR1/LR2/VLCC/ULCC (72,000 bbl to 4.0 mm bbl ultra large crude carrier) at about $0.84 /bbl at the pump based upon AFRA by LTBP (average freight rate assessment (AFRA) by London Tanker Brokers’ Panel (LTBP)) basically distributed to the 75 refineries handling 13.76 mm bbl/d on the USA east and west coasts with crude oil cleaning and recovery governed by the newer standards under MARPOL 73/78 Annex I Regulation 13 (6) and 13 B, and MARPOL Resolution A. 897(21) Amendments to the revised Specifications for the Design, Operation and Control of Crude Oil Washing Systems (Resolution A.446(XI), as amended by resolution A.497(XII) requiring mechanical process high pressure heated COW, ROB and LOT, although traditional mechanical process high pressure heated seawater washing and slop tanks are still in use for certain applications and amounts of ROB crude oil are used to recover the approximate 10% of crude oil initially ROB (about 800 tons or 5,719 bbl of recoverable crude oil depending upon ship DWT which could have a cumulative impact of over 57 mm bbl/y of LOT lost from production) and approximate 5% still ROB after the cleaning process. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crude_oil_washing and http://www.imo.org/blast/mainframe.asp?topic_id=306 and ISGOTT (International Safety Standards for Tankers and Terminals) and ICS/OCIMF: International Chamber of Shipping Oil Companies International Marine Forum and International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation (ITOPF)
  • rail tank cars carry about 3% of domestic and imported USA crude equaling about 262 mm bbl/d in 2013 in DOT 111, 112 and 114 hold 31,809 gallon (757 bbl) at about $10.00 to $17.00 /bbl basically distributed to the 75 refineries handling 13.76 mm bbl/d on the USA east and west coasts, plus interior USA 40 additional refineries handling an additional 4.39 mm bbl/d
  • truck tankers carry about 4% of domestic and imported USA crude equaling about 1.0 mm bbl/d  in DOT 407 hold 8,400 gallon trailer, 9,500 gallon trailer, 10,500 gallon trailer, 4,200 gallon truck tanks and 5,040 pull trailers at about $20.00 to $35.00/bbl basically distributed to the 75 refineries handling 13.76 mm bbl/d on the USA east and west coasts, plus interior USA 40 additional refineries handling an additional 4.39 mm bbl/d
  • pipelines carry about 70% of domestic and imported USA crude equaling about 14.0 mm bbl/d  and additional “DilBit” condensates in petroleum liquid pipelines under PHMSA/MMS and 49 CFR 195 regulated supervision consisting of about 57,000 miles of 8 inch (20,000 bbl/d) to 36 inch (600,000 bbl/d) trunk pipelines to “Hub” such as Cushing, Ok. (1,436,000 bbl/d “take-away capacity” and 1,739,000 bbl/d “deliver-in capacity, plus new expansions 2014) and 189,000 miles of all types of oil pipelines, gathering, transportation and distribution at about $5.00 to $12.00/bbl basically distributed to the 75 refineries handling 13.76 mm bbl/d on the USA east and west coasts, plus interior USA 40 additional refineries handling an additional 4.39 mm bbl/d
  • storage tanks for crude oil produced fluids handled by “separators”, “free-water knockouts”, “water treaters” and other similar handing facilities is stored in over 232,159 storage tank batteries with each tank  about 80,000 bbl (“Cupcake-like”) on the E&P well sites in 1989 (Gruy Engineering Corp., 1993) or 572,620 “Hub” above ground storage tank farms like Cushing, Ok (Entropy Ltd., 1989) with each tank about 600,000 bbl (“floating roof”) containing about 46 mm bbl of static capacity and then basically distributed to the 75 refineries handling 13.76 mm bbl/d on the USA east and west coasts, plus interior USA 40 additional refineries handling an additional 4.39 mm bbl/d. the storage tanks are exempted from regulation under RCRA Section 3001(b)(2)(a) as “basic sediment and water (“BS&W”) or “crude oil tank bottoms and oily debris”. Crude oil normally must be less than 1% BS&W when leaving the storage tank to the refinery, except in California and other areas where heavy crude less than 20 deg. API is handled in which case the crude contains about 3% water (Flakenhagen, 1995) for easing the carrying of the crude. In recent years DilBit is also used for diluent of Canadian Bitumen.

 

FORBES - Energy 4/26/2014
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency – January 2000
Heavy Oil Science Center

 

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