Situation

Advario Gas Terminal NV (formerly OTAGT) is located in the port of Antwerp. The company is a leading player in storage and distribution services for pressurised and liquefied gas. Among their services are the loading and unloading of trucks and rail cars, and ship transhipment operations.

One of Advario’s customers is Borealis. They decided several years ago to build a new propane hydrogenation plant in Kallo (Antwerp). This PDH plant can produce some 750,000 tonnes of propylene per year.

To supply the plant with sufficient raw materials, there was a need for a new propane storage tank with a net capacity of 135,000 m³. In addition, Advario was also asked to store Borealis’ intermediate product, propylene. Energy efficiency and the guarantee of continuity were key points for the customer in this project.

​Solution

OTAGT has chosen to collaborate with KH Engineering before. The relationship, meanwhile, dates from almost 20 years ago, so the trust between KH Engineering and Advario was in place right away.

For this specific project, KH Engineering provided the multidisciplinary design of the various facilities around the storage tank: the basic engineering, the detailed engineering, part of the procurement and support during construction. The basic engineering was started in 2019, on 8 February 2022, the storage tank was commissioned on schedule.

The result is a refrigerated propane storage tank located in the port of Antwerp, which is supplied by ship loading. From the tank, propane gas is pumped to Borealis via an underground pipeline. With the commissioning of this storage tank, Advario can call itself the largest independent propane gas storage terminal in Europe.