First of three phrases completed toward providing chemical storage
Arkema Innovative Chemistry has completed construction of 12 tanks, completing the first phase of a $16 million project to provide and expand storage capacity at the Hahnville site.
The completed tanks are the first of 22 total the company plans to build by 2019, said Brian Vallieu, plant manager.
“We used some existing assets, as well as some of the footprint of the original design,” Vallieu said of initiating the project’s first phase of $11 million for the company’s fixed storage tanks or what he called the “tank farm.” Construction was completed late last year with the tanks in service a little over a month ago.
Arkema has leased its 13-acre Hahnville location from Dow since 2009, as well as has 137 industrial sites in the world. The Hahnville site has 51 employees. The company’s products include adhesives, polymers, acrylics, resins and additives.
The facility was built with what Vallieu called a “unique logistics supply model” or just-in-time methodology that avoided storage by going directly to a shipping container rail tank or rail car, but it posed problems. The tank farm will provide storage, which he said would Arkema to “run the plant more efficiently.”
“I’ve been here about three years,” Vallieu said. “And it was very common we had material ready to ship, but didn’t have the rail car or tank to load the product and that caused production delays and inefficiencies.”
Although the addition isn’t what some consider exotic or exciting, he called it a welcome addition that will give the company a buffer or ability to store its products.
Arkema will still lease rail tanks and cars, but the tanks will lessen the number of them needed and that will translate into savings, Vallieu said.
Called the Arkema Acadia project, the company held a ribbon cutting for the project today (Thursday) at the plant site.
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