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Central oil storage (COS), or central storage, is the term used for a communal heating system that began to be utilized in the middle of the twentieth century.
The term also applies to industrial, plant and agricultural applications, all of which may or may not be communal in nature.
The concept involved using oil (usually kerosene, but sometimes gas oil), in the way that natural gas is used today – it being fed from a central source and metered into individual dwellings on a housing estate. [1] [2] The concept was utilized by major oil companies such as Shell [3] and BP. Each household was obliged to use their oil from their tank, unlike the situation where a consumer owns their own tank obtains their own oil.
The book Introduction to Architectural Science states about liquid fuel storage tanks, "often in a housing development a central storage tank is installed (usually underground) which will be filled by an oil company", and that a supply of liquid fuel is piped to individual apartments or houses from the central storage tank. [2]
Oil would be delivered by road tanker and discharged into a tank capable of holding, for example, 5000 gallons. This oil would then be piped to each home, initially through a master pipeline, which then subdivided underground with a branch leading into each property. [1] Each property was provided with a meter located on an outside wall which was read whenever necessary.
A 5,000-gallon tank would usually be installed on an estate numbering up to 50 or 60 properties, although they ranged from a low of about 12 up to a high of in the thousands. The majority of tanks were situated above ground in an elevated position. This meant the oil could flow into each house under the influence of gravity. Other tanks were situated underground and were equipped with an electric pump, usually feeding oil to a small 'header' tank, again in an elevated position, to allow gravity to then distribute the oil.
The level of oil in the tank would be checked regularly and new supplies ordered when necessary. One potential problem with this system is that it was possible, through negligence, for the tank to run dry, resulting in a number of properties being left with no heat.
From the early 1980s, their owners began to close down COS sites. The significant increases in the price of oil had led many customers to convert to gas, solid fuel, or even to install their own oil tank. With fewer and fewer users per site, and maintenance costs remaining the same, the oil companies went through a closure programme, resulting in few sites still being operational in the new millennium.
As at early 2008, the ownership of many sites is unclear. Sites have been sold through a number of companies which have then been closed down. This presents problems for householders and local authorities alike, for when a site experiences a problem – such as an unsafe bund wall, or even a leak – there is no one to pursue to correct matters.
Central oil storage is also performed at industrial and plant locations and operations. [4] Central oil storage in industrial applications may be utilized in part to conserve oil, because oil barrels may leak oil. [4]
Propane is a three-carbon alkane with the molecular formula C3H8. It is a gas at standard temperature and pressure, but compressible to a transportable liquid. A by-product of natural gas processing and petroleum refining, it is commonly used as a fuel in domestic and industrial applications and in low-emissions public transportation. Discovered in 1857 by the French chemist Marcellin Berthelot, it became commercially available in the US by 1911. Propane is one of a group of liquefied petroleum gases. The others include butane, propylene, butadiene, butylene, isobutylene, and mixtures thereof. Propane has lower volumetric energy density, but higher gravimetric energy density and burns more cleanly than gasoline and coal.
Pipeline transport is the long-distance transportation of a liquid or gas through a system of pipes—a pipeline—typically to a market area for consumption. The latest data from 2014 gives a total of slightly less than 2,175,000 miles (3,500,000 km) of pipeline in 120 countries of the world. The United States had 65%, Russia had 8%, and Canada had 3%, thus 76% of all pipeline were in these three countries.
An oil well is a drillhole boring in Earth that is designed to bring petroleum oil hydrocarbons to the surface. Usually some natural gas is released as associated petroleum gas along with the oil. A well that is designed to produce only gas may be termed a gas well. Wells are created by drilling down into an oil or gas reserve that is then mounted with an extraction device such as a pumpjack which allows extraction from the reserve. Creating the wells can be an expensive process, costing at least hundreds of thousands of dollars, and costing much more when in hard to reach areas, e.g., when creating offshore oil platforms. The process of modern drilling for wells first started in the 19th century, but was made more efficient with advances to oil drilling rigs during the 20th century.
Liquefied petroleum gas is a fuel gas which contains a flammable mixture of hydrocarbon gases, specifically propane, propylene, butylene, isobutane and n-butane.
Fuel oil is any of various fractions obtained from the distillation of petroleum. Such oils include distillates and residues. Fuel oils include heavy fuel oil, marine fuel oil (MFO), bunker fuel, furnace oil (FO), gas oil (gasoil), heating oils, diesel fuel and others.
Water heating is a heat transfer process that uses an energy source to heat water above its initial temperature. Typical domestic uses of hot water include cooking, cleaning, bathing, and space heating. In industry, hot water and water heated to steam have many uses.
A central heating system provides warmth to a number of spaces within a building from one main source of heat. It is a component of heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems, which can both cool and warm interior spaces.
Liquefied natural gas (LNG) is natural gas (predominantly methane, CH4, with some mixture of ethane, C2H6) that has been cooled down to liquid form for ease and safety of non-pressurized storage or transport. It takes up about 1/600th the volume of natural gas in the gaseous state (at standard conditions for temperature and pressure).
A fuel tank is a safe container for flammable fluids, often gasoline or diesel fuel. Though any storage tank for fuel may be so called, the term is typically applied to part of an engine system in which the fuel is stored and propelled or released into an engine. Fuel tanks range in size and complexity from the small plastic tank of a butane lighter to the multi-chambered cryogenic Space Shuttle external tank.
Heating oil is any petroleum product or other oil used for heating; a fuel oil. Most commonly, it refers to low viscosity grades of fuel oil used for furnaces or boilers use for home heating and in other buildings. Home heating oil is often abbreviated as HHO.
In industrial chemistry, coal gasification is the process of producing syngas—a mixture consisting primarily of carbon monoxide (CO), hydrogen, carbon dioxide, methane, and water vapour —from coal and water, air and/or oxygen.
An underground storage tank (UST) is, according to United States federal regulations, a storage tank, including any underground piping connected to the tank, that has at least 10 percent of its volume underground.
Storage tanks are containers that hold liquids, compressed gases or mediums used for the short- or long-term storage of heat or cold. The term can be used for reservoirs, and for manufactured containers. The usage of the word tank for reservoirs is uncommon in American English but is moderately common in British English. In other countries, the term tends to refer only to artificial containers.
The utility infrastructure of London, England comprises a range of services and facilities that support and enable the functioning of London as a world city. Infrastructure includes facilities associated with products and materials that are consumed such as electricity, gas, water, heating and liquid fuels; materials that are produced such as sewage and solid waste; and facilities that enable communication and connectivity – telecommunications.
Tank blanketing, also referred to as tank padding, is the process of applying a gas to the empty space in a storage container. The term storage container here refers to any container that is used to store products, regardless of its size. Though tank blanketing is used for a variety of reasons, it typically involves using a buffer gas to protect products inside the storage container. A few of the benefits of blanketing include a longer life of the product in the container, reduced hazards, and longer equipment life cycles.
Tankless water heaters — also called instantaneous, continuous flow, inline, flash, on-demand, or instant-on water heaters — are water heaters that instantly heat water as it flows through the device, and do not retain any water internally except for what is in the heat exchanger coil unless unit is equipped with an internal buffer tank. Copper heat exchangers are preferred in these units because of their high thermal conductivity and ease of fabrication. However, copper heat exchangers are more susceptible to scale buildup than stainless steel heat exchangers.
