MET (Maatschap Europoort Terminal) is a partnership of Mafina BV and Ruhr Oel GmbH. The company’s terminal in the deepwater port of Rozenburg receives the largest oil tankers and stores the crude in huge tanks. All of the oil has only two destinations: the Total refinery in Antwerp, Belgium, and the BP refinery in the Ruhr Area of Germany.

Pipeline connections

MET maintenance manager Mr. Johan de Jong said:’ Pipelines connect our tanks to the refineries. We are enlarging our storage capacity by building two new 100,000 m3 tanks. To give an idea of the scale: each tank has a diameter of 79 meters and heigh of 24 meters. Construction, including the foundations, takes nine to twelve months. The project includes 1,5 kilometers of new pipeline to connect the tanks to harbor jetty.’

For many years, Tebodin has supported MET  with expertise on operational and environmental safety, energy use, and the engineering of terminal modifications. According to Tebodin’s project manager Mr. Ronald van Marrewijk, it was therefore only logical that MET asked Tebodin to provide the basic engineering and permetting services for the expansion. ‘That was in 2009. After completing the work, we continued with the tender procedure for the EPC contractor.’

Challengign tie-ins

With Fabricom as the contractor and Tebodin as the contract supervisor, the actual construction work started in 2011. Mr. Van Marrewijk:’We represent MET and are responsible for the project safety, quality and progress. We check the contractor’s detail engineering and have several on-site supervisors. The tie-ins present the greatest challenge, with a maintenance stop at the Antwerp refinery dictating our timeframe. If a crude carrier would arrive earlier than expected, we would have had to stop the work. With an hour-to-hour schedule, we manage to do everything with just one day to spare. The project will be complited in February 2013 and MET has already entrusted Tebodin with several follow-up orders.’