The Best Time to Keep Tanks From Freezing in the Winter? Prepare Them in the Summer

Critical Fuel System - Campbell-Sevey Summer is an ideal time to get the water out of your fuel oil tanks, and freshen up the oil, before it causes freezing and other problems in the Winter. Critical Fuel Systems provides mission critical fuel oil systems for use with backup electrical generators and/or backup fuel systems for boiler plants. They provide complete fuel oil systems to meet the requirements of a particular mission critical installation/application. These systems are custom in nature and can range from a simple pump set to transfer oil from a main storage tank to a more involved system involving several pump sets providing fuel to boilers and/or to a number of generators. Typical installations include:
  • data centers
  • hospitals
  • financial institutions
  • governmental facilities
  • telecommunication installations
Basically anything that cannot stop running due to a power failure or an interruption of the normal fuel used for steam/heating production. These systems involve a large amount of instrumentation and controls. Besides starting and stopping the pumps that are transferring the fuel oil, the system will monitor levels in various tanks and monitor other conditions such as fuel oil temperatures, leaks, overfill conditions, etc. In many cases the system will be powered by separate power sources for reliability and will make use of redundant controllers (PLC’s) and redundant sensors. For very high reliability installations redundant communication systems are employed. Most devices on the system are networked together via an Ethernet system and will use touch screens to aid the operator in the monitoring and use of the system. With ever more fuel being stored on site as facilities increase in size and complexity there is a need for filtration of the fuel oil to be able to make sure it is safe to use over long periods of time. If a system has a week’s worth of fuel stored on site, this fuel may not be used for a long period of time if the system is only tested periodically. This fuel will need to be cleaned and conditioned, especially with the lean burning diesel engines now being used. The water and the resulting microbial growth will need to be removed. Also over time chemicals will be added to handle the microbes and to boost the cetane levels of the fuel. These filtration systems will run automatically on a periodic basis to maintain an installations fuel for a very long time. With over 70 years of pumping systems experience, Critical Fuel Systems provides design help to consulting engineers and “design-build” teams. Everything from system layout to sizing of system components to match the requirements of the application.    
The Best Time to Keep Tanks From Freezing in the Winter? Prepare Them in the Summer