18 • OIL
&
ENERGY
Fuel Storage
Brian Savage, President of Savage Associates, says temperatures are very important when blending fuels.
Blend With Care
Brian Savage offers advice
on maintaining fuel quality
and avoiding problems at
the bulk plant
BULK PLANT OPERATORS CAN PREVENT FUEL
quality issues, avoid downtime and even
reduce insurance premiums by attending
to the details of fuel blending and storage,
according to Brian Savage, President of
Savage Associates, specialists in petroleum
storage and distribution.
Plants that blend biodiesel with petro-
leum must be prepared to blend the fuels
thoroughly and without any major differ-
ence in temperature, according to Savage.
“The way to avoid problems is to not blend
B100 into home heating oil when the
temperature difference is greater than 20
degrees,” he explained.
“Bacteria is like a baby, and it needs food
in No. 2 oil, so it loves to see warmth and
water. The pour point on B100 can be pretty
tough, so people heat it up to mix it. So you
might have 70-degree biodiesel mixing with
40-degree No. 2 oil, and the water comes
out so you have droplets floating, which
leads to bacteria.”
FUEL AND WATER
Water in fuel seems to be a universal
problem throughout the U.S., according
to Savage. “It happens with ethanol too,
because ethanol and water love each other.
If you don’t clean out a tank that has been
used for gasoline before you add ethanol,
the water will attach to the ethanol, and
now you have two inches of ethanol and
water, and any vehicle you fill won’t even
make it out of the driveway,” he said.
Savage said the formation of stringy
solids in petroleum-biodiesel blends, which
has been reported periodically in recent
years, is likely attributable to off-temperature
blending. “A friend of ours in the oil busi-
ness had a problem a few years ago when
he blended 80-degree biodiesel with home
heating oil. He had nearly 80 calls from
people saying that they had run out of fuel,
and what had happened was a slime formed
that stuck to everything like witches hair
and caused clogging,” Savage explained.
“It was all because of the temperature.
Water is generated when two different
density products are mixed and there is a
temperature difference between the two.
You will have a problem of generating
microcosms in the water.”
To create stable mixes of petroleum and
biofuel, operators must use a static in-line
blender downstream of where the two
fuel lines meet, according to Savage. The
blender creates turbulence and emulsifies
the fuels so that a complete mix occurs.
He recounted an incident with a customer
who received a barge load of diesel that had
been blended with 2 percent biodiesel. The
fuels were incompletely blended, and the
B100 separated and settled to the bottom
of the tank. When they started dispensing
loads from the rack, the first fills were 50
percent biodiesel. “That had to do with
how it was blended when they put it in the
barge,” Savage said.
One of the worst things a fuel company
can do is to rely on sequential splash
blending of petroleum and biodiesel,
according to Savage. “People assume the
fuels will blend, but they don’t,” he said.
TANK HEATING
To store B100 properly and maintain a
workable pour point in all conditions, com-
panies need a tank that can be insulated and
equipped with an insertion heater, a heat
exchange system or another type of heater.
Lines that carry B100 must be heat-traced
and insulated, as should the pumping sta-
tion, the blend control system and other
fuel handling equipment.
Plant operators should also be prepared
when they handle Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel
(ULSD), because it is a very dry product
with lots of static electricity, according
to Savage. Pipeline operators don’t want
untreated ULSD in their pipelines because it
can’t move eight-and-a-half feet per second
without generating static charge. With all
the static electricity, a lubricity additive is
needed to cut down on friction, and biod-
iesel is a popular choice.
Savage also recommends that bulk plant
operators be vigilant about maintenance
and keeping their equipment up to date.
One mistake he sees all too frequently is a
failure to update obsolete equipment. Some
bulk plant operators will let equipment run
until it fails, only to find out that no one
stocks the replacement parts because the
equipment line has been discontinued.
He recommends that owners survey
their plant equipment and bring it up to
date so that everything can be serviced and
repaired as needed. “Before you go into the
heating season, know what equipment you
have in your plant,” he said. “Know what
equipment you have, and have it in writing.
Have a company that is familiar with your
plant come in and survey it and let you
know what the problems might be.”
MIND THE RULES
Companies with bulk plants should
also know all the pertinent regulations to
avoid compliance issues with fire inspec-
tors or the U.S. Occupational Safety and
Health Administration (OSHA). “I have
seen plants where people still jump from
the platform onto the top of the truck.
What do you do if he slips and falls?”
Savage said.
One potential benefit of regular bulk
plant maintenance is that companies can
reduce their insurance premiums. He said
he knows one fuel dealer who regularly
updates his bulk plant equipment and then
invites his insurance company to come and
inspect the improvements. “He tells them,
‘I don’t expect my premiums to go up,’ and
it works,” Savage said.
Insurance companies tend to make
assumptions about bulk plants, so it makes
sense to request an inspection after making
equipment upgrades, Savage said.
