Optimise your Tank Inspection and management plan with ALS.
Storage tanks are common real estate on processing plants, terminals and depots, including power stations, mine sites, oil and gas, and other major processing plants, and almost always hold critical or hazardous contents. Depending on the manufacturing process involved they will often contain one of the following:
- Hazardous chemicals, such as acids or important hydrocarbons such as petrol, diesel, oil, for which loss of containment frequently means significant environmental and collateral damage;
- Critical fluids which if lost or contaminated potentially threaten site production; or,
- Critical fluids which are the saleable product of the site in question. Any loss of these therefore leads to a loss of revenue as well as the other above risks.
The consequences of tank failure are therefore as high as almost any other asset class, particularly with loss of containment potentially allowing hundreds of thousands of litres of dangerous fluids into the surrounding environment and infrastructure. Legal requirements also apply to the management of many tanks and as such improper management can expose both company and individual managers to potentially significant associated penalties for poor practice.
The ALS Approach
ALS aligns tank integrity management with industry best practice, whilst also prioritising control of the above risks. Adopting an engineering led approach to tank inspection, ALS ensures both practicality and cost efficiency are delivered. This approach sees our qualified tank inspectors (API) working with our experienced engineering staff and NDT crews to deliver optimised tank inspection and management programs.
Where appropriate, the principals of Risk Based Inspection (RBI) are applied. When combined with a suite of best practice inspection and access techniques, ALS work with our clients to deliver:
- Extended tank inspection intervals where risk profiles allow.
- Designing and implementing tank inspection and test plans.
- Minimisation of tank downtime.
- Proper understanding and management of risks.
- Compliance with insurance and regulatory requirements.
- Reduced operating and maintenance costs.
- Optimised spend on inspection activities.
Our expert teams also provide:
- Full API 653 internal and external inspection using our API 653 qualified inspectors.
- Determination of the scope of repairs and alterations required.
- Provide defect tolerance and Fitness-For-Service assessments in accordance with relevant standards.
- Assessment of the remaining life of the tank.
- Investigation to determine the cause of any defects found and any failures.
ALS use best in class tank inspection techniques such as the latest Magnetic Flux Leakage (MFL) and Saturated Low Frequency Eddy Current (SLOFEC) tank floor scanners, tank wall UTT corrosion mapping, Restricted Access Phased Array (RAPA) inspections and laser scanning for corrosion mapping.