As part of our practice Facility Engineering Services has developed extensive experience in the design and analysis of tanks, bins and silos. Our experience includes design for storage of liquid and bulk materials storage including difficult and non flowing materials such as silage or other biomass. Facility Engineering Services has been involved in the design of steel welded and bolted smooth wall tanks, corrugated steel grain bins, concrete tanks and silos using both slip form and jump form construction techniques.
The field of bulk and liquid tank storage design a narrow and specialized field of engineering that should be performed by engineers with specific knowledge of the design loadings of these types of structures. Additionally, the knowledge of the types of analysis required for this design is not a normal part of most engineers practice and it is not typically taught in universities except at the most advanced graduate levels. Facility Engineering Services has this in depth capability.
Facility Engineering Services has the capability provide professional design services for granular and liquid materials using the following standards:
• ACI 313 covers material, design, and construction requirements for concrete silos, stave silos, and stacking tubes for storing granular materials. Silos and stacking tubes are special structures, posing special problems not encountered in normal building design and ACI 313, it puts forth special requirements and ways of considering the unique cases of static and dynamic loading from funnel flow, mass flow, concentric flow and asymmetric flow in silos and the special loading on stacking tubes.
• ASABE 433 standard presents methods of estimating the grain pressures within concentrically loaded and unloaded bins used to store free-flowing, agricultural whole grain. It is primarily used by the pre-engineered corrugated grain bin industry.
• API 620 is a standard to cover large, field-assembled storage tanks of the type described in 1.2 that contain petroleum intermediates (gases or vapors) and finished products, as well as other liquid products commonly handled and stored by the various branches of the industry. It is often used for as the design standard for tanks that contain other types of liquid materials.
• API 650 establishes minimum requirements for material, design, fabrication, erection, and testing for vertical, cylindrical, above ground, closed- and open-top, welded storage tanks in various sizes and capacities for internal pressures approximating atmospheric pressure.
• ACI 350 covers the structural design, materials selection, and construction of environmental engineering concrete structures that are used for conveying, storing, or treating liquid or other materials such as solid waste. Environmental structures are subject to uniquely different loadings, more severe exposure conditions, and more restrictive serviceability requirements than non-environmental building structures.
Facility Engineering Services also has extensive experience with non free-flowing biomass materials. There are no currently available standards for the design of these specialized structures in the United States. These structures can experience loads from domes, dome collapse, mechanical unloaders, and a variety of other uncommon load sources. Presently, we are actively involved in the development of a standard for the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers.
With their extensive background in code development and design, Facility Engineering Services has extensive experience with international engineering standards for the design of bulk and liquid containing structures. This experience includes but is not limited to the following:
• AS 3774 Specifies requirements for the determination of loads for the design of containment structures for the mass storage of bulk solids. The loads include permanent loads, normal service loads, environmental loads, and accidental loads.
• EN 1991-4 Part 4: Actions on silos and tanks. This standard describes the loads and design methodology for silos and tanks containing bulk and liquid contents.
• The National Farm Building Code of Canada provides minimum requirements for human health, fire safety, and structural sufficiency in farm buildings and storage structures.Tailored to the needs of the agricultural community, this concise document describes farm buildings and structures in detail.