1. Tank Emission Tracking Software: A
Comparative Analysis
Gary Vegh
ERA Environmental Management Solutions
Montreal, Canada

2. Things to consider when looking for a Tanks software:
• Facility type
• Process type
• Tank type
• Type of material stored in tank
• Are all Tanks programs created equally??

3. Industry/Process Types
• Oil Exploration (Crude Oil, Water, Dehydrator, Gas Line)
• Refinery (Crude Oil, Distillation, Storage, Mix, Packaging,
Loading)
• Midstream (Tank farm; Storage/Mix Tanks, Loading Racks;
Tank truck, Rail car, and Barge loading)
• Chemical plant (Tank farm; Storage/Mix Tanks)
• Industry/Manufacturing (ex. Automotive plant: gasoline,
methanol, engine oil, antifreeze storage tanks)

4. Tank Types
• Open top tank
• Horizontal tank
• Vertical fixed roof tank
• Internal floating roof tank
• External floating roof tank
• Domed external floating roof tank
• Mobile tank

5. Material Types
• Organic liquids (ex. 20% Toluene 80% Benzene)
• Petroleum distillates
• Crude oil
• Petroleum distillates - EPA standards
• Pure compounds (ex. 100% Methanol)

6. Materials & Calculations
• Some methods/tools only calculate certain situations:
– Organic mixtures
– Petroleum
– Crude oil
– Asphalt
– Pure substances
• Different approaches to calculations:
– AP-42 calculations (American Petroleum Institute; API equations)?
– Lab tested data?
– Industry assumptions?

7. Complexity of Tank Emissions Calculations
• Within Industry/Process many variables may apply
• The following is an example to illustrate different options that can be
taken to calculate Tanks emissions
– Only focus on material TVP

8. How do we calculate Tank emissions?
• Working Losses
• Standing Losses
• Material in Tanks exists in two (2) phases; a) Liquid b) gas (vapor)
• The vapor pressure (VP) plays an important role in calculating Tank emissions

9. Calculation of True Vapor Pressure (TVP)
• True Vapor Pressure (TVP)
– Distillation Slope
– Molecular weight (liquid)
– Molecular weight (vapor)
– Reid Vapor Pressure (RVP)
– Antoine Coefficients
– Reidel Coefficients
– Tested values

10. True Vapor Pressure (TVP)/Chemical Composition
• TVP can be one of the most challenging variables to calculate for materials
stored in tanks
– Complete Speciation - 100% known chemical composition
– Partial Speciation - Chemical composition NOT 100% known

11. Complete Speciation
• Most straightforward situation for determining TVP and emissions
– ~100% chemical components of substance known (Antoine or
Riedel coefficients per chemical)
• This is not always the case for the Oil & Gas industry.
• Process:
1. Use Antoine or Riedel coefficients and % by Weight data from
known chemical compositions to calculate the TVP per chemical
2. Calculate TVP for mixture
 Calculations required will depend on type of substance

12. Partial Speciation
• How do you calculate TVP if you don’t know the chemical composition of
your substance?
– Common example: Crude Oil/Petroleum products
• It’s possible to determine the TVP of the product:
– The REID VP of the mixture
– Distillation Slope
– Molecular weight of the liquid
– Molecular weight of the vapor

13. Tanks Process Flow

14. Tanks Data Flow (the BIG picture)

15. Managing large amounts of data
(How do you keep up?? What about 200 Tanks??)

16. Some available Tanks software/tools
• EPA Tanks 4.09 (US Environmental Protection Agency)
• E&P Tanks (American Petroleum Institute; API)
• Tanks ESP (TGB; Rob Ferry)
• ERA Tanks Module (ERA Environmental Management
Solutions)
• *note: (there are other Tank software/tools not listed in this presentation)

17. An analysis of Functionality (Tank Type)
Categories of Supported functionalities Functionality/ supported dataset
TANKS
4.09
E&P ESP ERA
Tank type Available to perform calculations for different types of
tanks? (ex. Fixed. Vs. Floating roof) If so, select all available
tank types below
Tank type
Open top tank N N N Y
Horizontal tank Y N Y Y
Vertical fixed roof tank Y N Y Y
Internal floating roof tank Y N Y Y
External floating roof tank Y N Y Y
Domed external floating roof tank Y N Y Y
Mobile tank N N Y Y

18. An analysis of Functionality (Tank Emission Types)
Categories of Supported functionalities Functionality/ supported dataset
TANKS
4.09
E&P ESP ERA
Tank Emission Types
Emission Types
Heating N N Y Y
Roof Landing N N Y Y
Cleaning N N Y Y
Evaporation (open top tanks) N N N Y
Standing Y Y Y Y
Flashing N Y Y Y
Working Y Y Y Y
Loading (mobile sources - tanks, ships, barge, etc) N N Y Y
Calculations available
Material mixture types in tanks
Organic liquids (ex. 20% Toluene 80% Benzene) Y Y Y
Petroleum distillates Y Y Y
Crude oil Y Y Y
Petroleum distillates - EPA standards with pre-filled
properties
Y Y Y

19. An analysis of Functionality (Tank Recordkeeping for tank
throughputs)
Categories of Supported functionalities Functionality/ supported dataset
TANKS
4.09
E&P ESP ERA
Recordkeeping for tank throughputs
Daily records
importing function N Y Y
manual entry N Y Y
Weekly records
importing function N Y Y
manual entry N Y Y
Monthly records
importing function N Y Y
manual entry Y Y Y
Annual records
importing function N Y Y
manual entry Y Y
"Grouped" records
"Grouped" tank - automated distribution N N Y
"Grouped" tank - archiving functionality when distribution
changes
N N Y
Revisions Material revision tracking N Y Y
Input for tank chemical speciation
Liquid
Full Speciation (From liquid composition) Y Y Y Y
Partial Speciation (From liquid composition) Y Y Y Y
Vapor Vapor Weight Speciation Y Y N Y

20. Questions??
Thank You for attending this presentation.
Gary.vegh@era-ehs.com