Important developments are also taking place at Southampton, which is becoming more and more a port of call for large Atlantic liners and other vessels. The British Mexican Petroleum Company, the Anglo American Oil Company, and the Agwi Petroleum Cor poration are all establishing storage facilities at this port. The British Mexican Company have a wharf at Itchen, and have bunkered many large vessels by means of their barges, which go alongside vessels wherever they may be. The company owns seven acres of land which is being converted into an oil fuel depot and bunkering station. The total capacity of the tanks will be 24,000 tons, and these arc connected to the jetty at the mouth of the lichen by means of pipe-lines. The channel when completed will have a depth of 30 ft., allowing oil tankers to reach the jetty. From here the oil is pumped into the tanks or in the case of bunkering a vessel in Southampton water the oil is transferred from the tanks to lighters which carry the oil out to the vessel.
The Agwi Petroleum Company's facilities included several berths, each of which will consist of a wharf of from 80 to 100 ft. long, and, when completed, it will be possible to berth tankers of 15,000 tons.
An extensive oil fuel depot and bunkering arrange ments have been installed by the British Mexican Com pany on the Clyde. The site of the depot occupies a considerable area, extending from the North British Railway Company's line to low-water mark of the river frontage. The disadvantage of being unable to turn a ship in the navigable channel of the river after receiving her bunkers has been overcome by the construction of a basin. This basin is 600 ft. in length and 200 ft. in breadth. Four 10 in. pipe-lines heated by internal steam pipes run out from the tanks to the heads of four specially-constructed jetties, which project from the east side of the basin, and are so designed as to accom modate vessels at the most convenient angles, having regard to prevailing winds and tides. The storage capacity of the tanks at the station is 20,000 tons, and oil is pumped down the pipe-line by two of the largest pumps which Messrs. G. & J. Weir have yet constructed, enabling a ship with sufl•iciently large pipe connections to receive oil at the rate of 400 or 500 tons per hour. The unique arrangement of valves in the power-house makes it possible for two or three ships to he bunkered simultaneously in the basin, and at the .arne time for a tanker to pump oil up to replenish the stock in the storage tank. The company have made arrange ments for a satisfactory means of hunkering boats at the tail of the bank, or at any point in the Clyde. For this purpose a number of steel barges with capacities varying from :300 to 1,200 tons have been provided.
In the storage of the large quantities of fuel oil during the war extensive concrete reservoirs were built at kosyth, resigned for a total capacity of 60,000,000 gallons. Although this type of reservoir had been employed in oil-producing countries abroad, this was the first occasion of their use in this country, and they were built partly in mass concrete and partly in reinforced concrete. The utmost care was taken to lay the concrete so that there might be a minimum of cracks, but despite all this it was found necessary to cover the floor with 6 in. of concrete having two layers of expanded
metal in it. The mix of this further layer was 24 : 14 : 1, other mixes being 7 : 3 : 1, the stone being broken to pass through a 2 in. ring for mass work, and the fine concrete for facing was composed of a mix of 3 : : the stone being broken to pass through a # in. ring. The usual form of holder is a cylindrical steel tank, which may be obtained in various standard sizes. A typical example of the 2,000,000 gallon tank is 114 ft. 6 in. diameter by 32 ft. high, with a bottom plate of f in., the first or lowest course of all plates being it in. ; a somewhat heavier type, having the same capacity, is 112 ft. diameter by 32 ft. 9 in. high, and having i in bottom plates and -14 in. plates for the first course.
In both cases the roof, which is of the lightest construc tion, is supported from a central tower. An obvious advantage of steel tanks is that they occupy very little space compared with their capacity, and in the case of a fire it is seldom that a whole tank collapses. On the other hand, an advantage of concrete tanks is that the oil contained will not be affected to a very great extent by atmospheric temperature fluctuations, so that the amount of steam heating required will remain fairly constant one season of the year.
With the great increase in the adoption of oil vessels, extensive arrangements have had to be made for bunker ing vessels with oil at various ports along the main trade routes. This chain of storage depots has now become so world-wide, and is so well organized, that wherever an oil-driven vessel may be she can replenish her fuel supplies as readily as coal burning ships can bunker.
The following are the chief ports where oil depots arc now established—Adelaide, Alexandria, Amoy, Amsterdam, Antwerp, Augusta (Sicily), Avonmouth, Birkenhead, Barrow-in-Furness, Belfast, Bremerhaven, Batavia, Bangkok, Buenos Aires, Bilbao, Balik Pappan, Bombay, Brixham, Bizerta, Bergen, Baltimore, Bayonne (New Jersey), Barbados, Boston, Cardiff, Constanza, Colombo, Calcutta, Canton, Capetown, Campana, Callao, Curacao, Copenhagen, Christiania, Dublin, Enna, Foynes (near Limerick), Foochow, Grangemouth, Glasgow, Genoa, Gothenburg, Galveston, Hull, Hamburg, Hong Kong, Hangkow, Halifax (Canada), Havana, Honolulu, Iquique, Jacksonville, Kobe, Karachi, London, Las Palmas, Lisbon, Manchester, Mombassa, Madras, Mel bourne, Monte Video, Macassar, Manila, Montreal, Noworowik (Batun), Nagasaki, New York, New Orleans, Newcastle, Norfolk. Va Oregon, Port Edgar (Firth of Forth), Port:mouth, Purfleet , Plymouth, Penang, Portl.uul, Port Said, Prince Rupert. Philadelphia, Port Arthur, Providence, Pernambuco, Rouen, Rangocn, Rio de Janeiro, Rotterdam, Sunderland, St. Louis (France), Suez, Sorenbar, Surabaya. Singapore, Saigon, Swatow, Shanghai, Santos. St. Thomas, St. Vincent, San Francisco, Stockholm, Southampton, Savona, San Juan, San Pedro, Thames Haven, Tampico, Tuxpam, Trinidad, Tampa, Vancouver, Vera Cruz, Valparaiso, Venice, Yokohama.