Project details:

CWA was commissioned by Kinder Morgan to design a fully-enclosed, self-cleaning containment pan system at Berth 4 of the Vancouver Wharves site to reduce product spillage, allow for product recycling, and mitigate potential environmental risks.

Challenges:

Kinder Morgan wanted a solution that would virtually eliminate any chance of product spilled from their sulphur shiploaders making its way into the marine environment below the machines. The original shiploader design would not support a significant increase to structural loads.

Solutions:

CWA successfully designed and implemented an innovative concept to collect, monitor, discharge, and recycle the spilled product.

The design of stainless steel “hanging curtain”-style containment pans provided a lightweight solution.

With the increased load resulting from the enclosed pans, more frequent wash downs were necessary to prevent an overload from occurring. CWA implemented a sophisticated electronic load-measuring and monitoring cleaning system with built-in safeguards to detect the spillage amount captured by the containment pans and alert operators to activate the fully automated, high-pressure spray wash-down system in the event of product buildup.

CWA also designed a fully contained launder system to direct spilled product to an onshore containment waste treatment system, allowing the product to remain uncontaminated and be returned to the stockpile for reloading onto vessels.