The Valdez Marine Terminal: improvements to final stop of trans-Alaska oil pipeline.

• Author: Bohi, Heidi
• Position: OIL & GAS

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After making an arduous journey through the trans-Alaska pipeline system (TAPS), from Milepost 0 on the North Slope to Valdez at the southern end of the route, the crude oil that travels through the 800 miles of steel pipe makes Valdez the last stop before being loaded onto tankers for transport to market. Since the pipeline first began moving oil in 1977, more than 15 billion barrels have arrived here before being loaded onto one of more than 19,000 tankers that sailed through the Hinchenbrook Entrance, the main passage entering and leaving Prince William Sound.

A cash register of sorts, the Valdez Marine Terminal, known by employees and Valdez locals as "the VMT," encompasses more than 1,000 acres and has facilities for crude oil metering, storage, transfer and loading. Incoming crude oil is metered and sent to one of 510,000-barrel storage tanks or directly to a tanker that will deliver the oil to markets worldwide. The VMT is home to 18 crude tanks--15 of which are active--used to manage oil inventory. The 18 tanks are located in two areas: tanks 1 through 14 are located at the east tank farm and tanks 15 through 18 are located in the west tank farm, where only tank 16 is active.

Altogether, the gigantic tanks make up a critical piece of infrastructure and play an important part in getting oil from the ground to the refineries and then to the gas pump. Alyeska Pipeline Service Co. (APSC), which manages the pipeline for its five owners, has procedures in place to make sure the tanks are sound and safe. Each enormous tank rises 63 feet high and 250 feet across and can hold 510,000 barrels of oil at a time. The total capacity of the 15 tanks is 7.3 million barrels. With all of that crude oil, each tank needs a thorough cleaning and inspection once every 10 to 20 years. It takes about 100 people to plan, coordinate and carry out a tank cleaning.

EXXON VALDEZ INCREASES PREPAREDNESS RESPONSE

Since the Exxon Valdez oil tanker ran aground in March 1989, spilling 260,000 barrels of crude into Prince William Sound, APSC has made prevention, and marine and emergency preparedness for response key components of its corporate safety culture. Before transfer to a tanker begins at the VMT, crews place an oil-spill containment boom around the entire berth and the tanker. At the same time, to reduce hazardous air emissions, the tanker is connected to the VMT's vapor-control system, which collects crude-oil vapors from the vessel...