Saunders Completes Acid Tank For Terminal

Construction company Saunders International Ltd has recently completed a major acid storage tank for Darwin's East Arm Terminal project.

In February, Vopak Terminals Australia commissioned the company to build an acid tank for the East Arm Terminal, 20 kilometres outside of Darwin. The terminal already houses a number of tank storage facilities.

Northern Territory Chief Minister, Clare Martin, announced the acid storage tank as part of the new port facilities being built in Darwin. A greenfield site adjacent to the new East Arm Wharf will provide 130 hectares of land for the Darwin Business Park, with large tracts of industrially zoned land.

The acid tank will allow major mining companies to source sulfuric acid locally instead of maintaining acid production facilities on site. Vopak Terminals Australia owns and manages a bulk liquid storage terminal in Darwin. It will use the new tank to store its customer's bulk acid shipments before they are transported by road to the mines.

The tank is fabricated from Grade 250 XLERPLATE® steel. Its floor and roof plates are butt welded, rather than lap welded, as is usually the case with water or petroleum storage tanks.

"Acid tanks use heavier, thicker plate than usual due to acid's high specific gravity and a three millimetre corrosion allowance required to be incorporated into the design," Operations Manager, Saunders International, Rob Patterson said.

"We chose XLERPLATE® steel for the project because it is locally manufactured, of a high quality and we get very good customer service and technical back up from BlueScope Steel."

The tank took 23 weeks to build and incorporates an umbrella roof, which needed to be self supporting with an external support structure to limit the risk of corrosion.

"Due to a late wet season we were under pressure from the start to maintain the completion date because Vopak was committed to receiving acid and the completion date could not slip," Mr Patterson said.

"However, our experienced crew met the challenge and the tank was completed on time." Saunders fabricated the tank's components at its workshop in Condell Park, New South Wales, and transported them to Darwin by road.

The tank is one of 22 owned and operated by Vopakin the Northern Territory.

The company specialises in bulk storage and handling of liquid products, with 75 tank terminals in 30 countries.