Page 323 - Hydrocarbon Exploration and Production Second Edition

310 Facilities

export tanker

SBM

storage tanker

Figure 11.44 Tanker storage and export.

Loading is carried out through a single buoy mooring (SBM) to which the tanker can
tie up and rotate around to accommodate the prevailing weather conditions. The SBM
has no storage facility, but if a production facility has storage capacity sufficient to
continue production whilst the tanker makes a round trip to off-load, then only a
single tanker may be required. In some areas, the SBM option has been developed to
include storage facilities such as the ‘SPAR’ type storage terminals used in the North
Sea. Such systems may receive crude from a number of production centres and act as
a central loading point (Figure 11.43).
In some cases, two tankers are used either alternately loading and transporting,
or with one tanker acting as floating storage facility and the other shuttling to and
from a shore terminal (Figure 11.44).