Tank Farm Facilities: Crowley and Colville improve and expand fuel storage.

• Author: Ward, Sarah
• Position: CONSTRUCTION

Most everywhere Alaskans live, at least one farm is nearby. No, not the approximately 762 farms that raise crops and livestock for sale (the smallest number in any state). Tank farms, or above-ground storage facilities, are essential infrastructure wherever fuel or other liquids must be stockpiled. The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation regulates sixty-five tank farms with capacities greater than 5,000 barrels of crude oil or 10,000 of non-crude. Below that, the US Environmental Protection Agency regulates facilities with as little as 1,320 gallons, but an exact total on the number is not available. Anywhere two large cylinders stand near each other, that's a tank farm.

Some of the state's newest tank farm infrastructure expands capacity in two distinct ways. The projects serve radically different users in widely divergent locations, yet the builders had a similar mission when constructing them. Logistics firms Crowley and Colville both exercised caution and forethought to ensure these new additions to Alaska's petroleum landscape are safe and will be around for a long time.

Military Tanks

The Defense Logistics Agency Energy (DLA Energy) awarded Crowley a contract to build and operate a 500,000-barrel (approximately 21 million gallons) bulk fuel storage facility in North Pole to support Eielson Air Force Base and Fort Wainwright. The project is like one Crowley completed in 2011 for DLA Energy at the Port of Anchorage, now the Port of Alaska. That facility was doubled in size in 2015, now providing 1 million barrels of product storage for Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, just up the bluff from the port. Crowley is in the second five-year term of its operating contract.

For the North Pole project, Crowley was awarded the contract in July 2020. It was a "greenfield" facility, built from the ground up. Eighteen months later, the tanks and supporting infrastructure are operational.

"The design is based on a really long lifespan," says Scott Mulvihill, director of government operations and government services at Crowley. "There are tank farms, even within Alaska, that some of the tanks were built in the 1900s-1914. 1920. Those tanks are still in service, so when you construct it, you're not looking at a window that would be less than fifty years. You want to get a lot of life out of it." This farm was built to stand up against corrosion, earthquakes, and wind and water damage. With durability in mind, Crowley used materials with a...