Shirashima Oil Storage Terminal: Large-Scale Floating Facility
The Shirashima Oil Storage Terminal is a large-scale, floating facility with an oil storage capacity of 5.6 million kiloliters. Located southeast of Shirashima Island, about 8 km off the northern coast of Kyushu, it consists of a 60- hectare mooring basin for eight oil storage barges, a 14-hectare ground operation yard, and a sea berth connected by a 840-meter-long pipe trestle assembly.
Construction of the Shirashima Oil Storage Terminal was started in October 1984 but was suspended for three years from 1987 to 1990 because the breakwaters then under construction were partly damaged by unexpectedly high waves in February 1987. In 1990, construction work was resumed. The project completed August 31, 1996.
The barge mooring basin is surrounded by four breakwaters, 2,350 meters in length, so that eight oil storage barges may be kept safe even from the potentially extremely high waves caused by typhoons or monsoons.
The breakwaters that surround the mooring basin function as a secondary oil dike.
The oil storage barge has a 700,000 kl storage capacity. Of rectangular shape, it is 397 meters in length, 82 meters wide and 25.4 meters in depth. It has no propulsion machinery.
