In Conversation
AVONMOUTH – OPEN FOR ALL GRADES
Avonmouth now has a total tankage of 33,733 tonnes with
these three distillate tanks being brand new additions
UNTIL 6AM ON MONDAY 30TH JANUARY VALERO’S AVONMOUTH TERMINAL HAD BEEN OFFERING JUST TWO GRADES – DIESEL
AND UNLEADED – FOR A PERIOD OF SEVERAL YEARS. FOLLOWING A MULTI-MILLION POUND EXPANSION, ON THAT MORNING
KEROSENE AND GAS OIL ALSO BECAME AVAILABLE TO CUSTOMERS USING THIS SOUTH WEST TERMINAL
With capacity at the terminal having now
tripled Fuel Oil News editor Jane Hughes paid
a visit on a very sunny day in early March to
see the transformation in the flesh and what a
transformation.
The site now benefits from three
enormous additions in the form of distillate
tanks totalling almost 21,000 tonnes for the
storage of kerosene, gas oil and diesel plus
additional storage capacity for unleaded.
Previously operating with a storage capacity
of 12,280 tonnes, at one time the site did
have 15 tanks, now there are just 6 product
tanks and two new ethanol tanks with a total
storage of 33,733 tonnes.
Having already made significant
investment in its terminals at Manchester,
Kingsbury and Cardiff with positive results, the
Valero team looked at the market in the south
west and, having worked out the project’s
viability, the upgrade of the terminal started in
January 2015.
Getting the project underway
Before touring the terminal Fuel Oil News
spoke with terminal manager Sean Dixon who
has worked at Avonmouth as an operator
20 Fuel Oil News | April 2017
and as assistant manager since 2002, Rob
Brailsford, now responsible for operations, who
originally started out as a driver in the early
1980s, and commercial sales manager Kevin
Gullen.
“The terminal is in a strategic location in
Avonmouth, being closely situated to the M4/
M5 corridor,” said Sean.
“Having first consulted with our customers,
we established that demand for more fuel
grades and greater volumes of product was
definitely there. A lack of commercial grades
in this region meant that many customers
were having to travel a fair distance to obtain
supplies and that this came at a considerable
cost,” explained Kevin.
“Once the project got underway there
were 70 contractors on site with 6,500 man
hours per month being performed,” added
Sean.
“We established a contractors’ village with
Portakabins to safely support our excellent
contractor workforce.”
This village will remain on site for the rest
of the year but once removed, the area will
allow parking for 28 vehicles enabling more
customers to safely park tankers overnight.
The project is expected to finish by Q4
when the terminal’s control room will also
have been rebuilt and refurbished.
Up close
The terminal now has 5 loading bays – three
for middle distillates and two for gasoline and
diesel.
“Faster loading means drivers can achieve
more in a working day and if a pump goes
down, the system has been configured to
ensure that we have redundancy and the
whole rack does not stop working; this in turn
gives greater reliability,” Rob explained.
Whilst making a closer inspection of
all 8 product tanks Rob explained that the
brand new tanks had been sized from a
sales and supply perspective informed by
conversations with Valero’s supply team in
London. Additionally, whilst the older bund has
concrete beneath, the new tank farms have an
impermeable matting.
At the time of FON’s visit, the paint was
still wet on the terminal’s two ethanol tanks
which will soon form part of a system that
blends ethanol into gasoline at the loading
bay.