Chemical Treatment vs. Mechanical Operations in Tank Cleaning: Who Won?

Sludge removal from a storage tank is an easy task if the objective is just to increase the storage capacity. However, sludge transformer in crude oil is much desirable in order to benefit from the value of the recovered crude. Desludging approaches used could be chemical or mechanical. The objective of this paper is to evaluate both these approaches and propose the most cost effective methodology in tank cleaning operations. No doubt that performing the cleaning task without opening the tank is of advantage. Also working without adding chemical products, heating or applying steam is safer for the facilities and the workers. Other aspects that are discussed in the paper include the need to eliminate pollution of air and soil, in addition to changing the sludge into crude which can be sold in the international market. Furthermore, real examples are discussed in the paper where the sludge in the tank was about 30.7 ft and the cleaning process is explained in detail. One of the examples shows how 74 676 barrels of sludge changed to crude in only 37 days by optimizing the applied technique.