Numerical Analysis of Fire Water Storage Tank under Seismic Loading

Abstract

Maintenance and continuously monitoring the condition of above ground storage tanks are significant when the tanks are placed in service. The American Petroleum Institution (API) 653 and other international codes provides the minimum requirements for inspection & maintaining the integrity of tanks during its service. The tank settlement is one of the major threats for tank’s integrity. In this paper, a storage tank is assessed for uniform settlement under various loading condition such as seismic, dead load, static load, corrosion loss of shell plate etc. In the present study, a finite element model is designed with uniform settlement condition and study of its governing hoop stress at shell plate has been carried out under different loading conditions. A fire water storage tank (constructed with IS 2060 GR. B material) and different seismic zones in India are taken for this study. The finite element analysis simulation shows that increase of hoop stress in the bottom shell course due to uniform settlement, the decrease in plate thickness and with different seismic active regions. Moreover, the maximum stresses have been observed at shell bottom course (close to bottom plate).