Safety Flaws of Flexi Bags We hear about spillage / leakage and the contamination of liquid cargoes ever too often in today’s logistic arena, resulting in not only a significant loss of time and money for the companies involved, but also heavy consequences in terms of safety, penalties, claims as well as accountability for environmental destruction. The leading cause of such incidents are almost impossible to pinpoint, however they are often blamed to the so-‐called uncontrollable external factors, such as improper handling by third party members, untrained loaders/dischargers, unskilled truck drivers, manufacturer defects, and so on. However, we at UCL believe that the most fundamental cause of such incidents are less due to human error, and more because of the continued use of Flexi bags to transport bulk liquid cargoes in the first place. Whether they are used for non-‐hazardous liquid or not, this method of transportation clearly favours nothing else but cost saving, showing absolutely no respect for safety, quality, and integrity of sustainable corporate practices. This report uncovers the inconvenient truths behind the use of flexi bags for the transportation of bulk liquid cargo, and h ope to encourage all vested companies to re-‐evaluate what is actually at stake.
What you need to know Flexi Bags (commonly known as Flexitanks, which is misleading as it is not a tank) are a one-‐time-‐use-‐and-‐discard solution for the transportation of bulk liquid cargo. The bag, made out of plastic (polyethylene and/or polypropylene) is loaded inside a regular 20’ dry box container, filled with liquid content through a valve using a pump, sealed and transported by road, rail, and sea. A seemingly cheaper method of moving bulk liquid cargo due to it’s one way design, flexibility, and easy disposal compared to a reusable stainless-‐steel pressure vessel of an ISO tank container. However there is a big catch. THEY BREAK
Flexi bags are loaded into a regular dry box container with very little protection. Corrugated cardboards, Styrofoam sheets and Kraft papers are often used to minimize abrasion against the container walls. The resulting pressure placed on the sidewall panels, together with the pressure endured from acceleration forces during transit (which includes sloshing and shifting centre of gravity) causes the container to bulge, deform and buckle right up to structural damage causing the bag to leak, spill, or rupture. The deformation of the container poses serious hazards to not only your cargo, but every other containers around that are stacked on top of each other or below. Onboard ships, trucks, rails, on ports or depots, wherever the spillage occurs the cost of clean ups can be astronomical, especially if it result in damaging other cargoes, shipping decks and terminals. 1 ETS Consulting studied that 3,735 Flexi Bags in the UK suffered incidents in 2013. 55% due to failure of bladder, 40% due to leakage, and 5% due to esplosions. (25% of these incidents are said to have caused major costs and disruptions). What is absurd is that there are presently no agreed standards regarding the construction of flexi bags, and there is not an approved form of packaging for the carriage by sea of dangerous goods classified under the IMDG Code. There has also been an investigation conducted by Germanshcer Lloyd -‐ a safety classification 2 organization commissioned by DNV GL, whom concluded that Flexi Bags weighing above 15tons cannot be shipped safely by sea. The usual capacity of Flexi Bags being offered in the industry today is 18-‐24tons. 1 2
(Source: ‘Well Bladdered’, Hazardous Cargo Bulletin, 2013, www.hazardouscargo.com/content/well-bladdered) (Source: ‘Examination of Flexitanks carried out by Germanischer Lloyd for GDV’, 2012, pg 7)
Typical Flexi bag set up
Sidewall Deformation
Frequent leakage/spillage
Heavy consequences