When you have questions about chemical storage or concerns about your chemical storage tank system, you want quick answers. You want to know who to call and get a live voice without getting the runaround. A solid customer service team takes great pride in delivering service that saves you time and eliminates any hassles.
Customer service is the first line of contact for all customer related calls. Some of the most frequent questions our customer service representatives receive are related to basic chemical storage. Customers or prospects often call asking about how to store a specific chemical - such as sulfuric acid or sodium hypochlorite.
The chemical tank storage solution always begins with building around the challenges and potential hazards of storing a specific chemical. The type of chemical, location, and other usage factors determine the best and safest solutions to many storage tank system requirements.
Other frequent customer service questions deal with conducting tank inspections. When we receive these types of calls, customer service provides the information needed to conduct a tank inspection or arranges for a Poly Processing field technician tank inspection.
At PPC we see 5 common mistakes that occur at the time of installation. Learn more about these five mistakes so that you can be prepared before you install a polyethylene chemical storage tank.
A modified vent may create less than adequate CFM throughput. Inadequate venting not only increases the risk of a hazard, but the tank in many cases may no longer be under warranty due to venting guidelines and/or not meeting the venting requirements for the tank size and application.
In order to avoid the costly problems of an improper venting system, we’ll work with you before we manufacture and assemble your tank system. This will ensure that your tank’s engineering is right the first time. It may cost a little more up front, but it will save money in the long run—and you won’t have to deal with environmental, health, and safety compliance issues down the road.
Because of the nature of polyethylene to expand and contract, we require flexible connections at the bottom ⅓ of the sidewall on many Poly Processing tanks. If proper flexible connections aren’t installed, any kind of movement of the tank can put harmful stress on the plumbing and cause a break or breach to peripheral plumbing and in worse case scenarios the rigid plumbing could ultimately crack the tank, leading to a more hazardous situation.. This is especially critical in regions that are susceptible to earthquakes, and tanks that could get moved or bumped by heavy equipment.
Other customers hire contractors to install the connections and the contractor fails to use flexible connections. Or, for situations where a flexible connection is used, the pipes aren’t aligned correctly and the flexibility is maxed out at installation which in turn does not allow the flex connection to perform as intended.
Don’t skimp on this requirement. Flexible connections are a necessity to ensure your chemical tank system maintains its integrity.
All too often we see tanks that are installed in buildings with very little planning. When a tank is at the end of its useful life, you’ll need to be able to access it and remove it from the building. More importantly, you’ll need to be able to install a new tank in its place. If the old tank is entombed it can be cut up and removed, but the new tank must be installed as a whole.
End use customers have had to remove building roofs and outer walls in order to install new tanks because the customer never planned for tank replacement. When this happens, the additional cost of removing parts of your facility’s structure can add up.(i.e. labor, machinery, downtime, etc.)
It’s important to consider the tank size you will need during the construction of your facility. This will prevent you from having to remove a wall or part of the roof during installation and removal.
Before you order your tank, think through questions such as these:
As a best practice, we recommend using our Installation, Operation, and Maintenance Manual to reference at all times. This is especially important when your chemical storage tank has an IMFO fitting molded as part of it. While the fitting itself is molded as an integral part of the tank and assembled at our plant site, it is critical that the IMFO neck and its piping be properly supported at all times.
When plumbing to the IMFO, make sure all valves and piping are supported by the ground or by other means - not by the IMFO fitting or the tank. Improper support could put pressure on the fitting or the tank, risking your operation, chemical, and employee safety.
When we deliver a tank, we ask the customer to retorque all of the fittings to the Installation and Operation Guide standards and hydro test the tank for a minimum of 24 hours by first filling it with water. This ensures that there are no leaking fittings before a hazardous chemical fills the tank. Unfortunately, this doesn’t always happen and customers may immediately add the chemical they purchased the tank to store. Fittings can loosen up during transportation and installation which would cause the chemical to leak from the tank and create an immediate problem or hazard to resolve.
Be sure you know the proper torque for your tank’s fittings, and don’t take shortcuts. Follow the torquing procedure in the Poly Processing Installation Guide to prevent costly mistakes.
To maintain safe storage of chemicals and proactively detect cracks, weak seams and fittings, and other storage tank stress points that could develop into potential leaks or spills, a comprehensive annual chemical storage tank maintenance inspection is strongly recommended. Even if the polyethylene tank is relatively new, a routine maintenance schedule and proper maintenance checklist and careful visual inspection of the chemical tanks is suggested.
Here is an annual tank inspection checklist. Follow these steps and conduct a storage tank inspection on a regular basis at least annually to ensure the safety of personnel, properly functioning tank system, and the preservation of the chemical stored. When performing routine maintenance, indications or signs of stress cracking, crazing, or embrittlement are discovered, the chemical storage tank may need to be replaced.
It’s important to conduct a poly tank inspection to prevent injury and property damage from leaks and spills of chemicals. These nine steps follow the basic annual chemical storage tank checklist. Please refer to the annual tank inspection checklist for a printable, checklist copy to document the inspection and for vital storage tank inspection warnings.
If you have a chemical storage question, or problem with an existing tank, download our IOM Manual here or contact a chemical storage tank specialist on our customer service team.