According to the requirements of the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, the necessary capacity of the slop tank of an oil tanker should not be less than 3% of the ship's oil carrying capacity under normal circumstances. But taking a VLCC ship as an example, the volume of its slop tank is between 6000m3 and 10000 m3. If a space with such a large volume is not allowed to be loaded with cargo oil and is left idle when the ship is free It will lead to great economic losses and a waste of resources. In order to explore the question of whether the slop tank of an oil tanker can be used as a cargo berth, this article draws on the legal basis of the slop tank (slop tank) of an oil tanker that can be loaded with cargo oil and makes a corresponding analysis.

The volume of the slop tank is involved in the calculation of the net tonnage. The calculation result has fully indicated that the volume of the slop tank is part of the total volume of the cargo space of the ship. According to the requirements of the Convention, the data will be entered into the "International Tonnage Certificate" of the ship, which has legal effect, which directly proves that the slop tank is a cargo space.

When the tanker is loading cargo, the cargo oil tank must be in a suitable state. There are no residues of dirty ballast water and washing water in the cargo oil tank, and there is no need to use a slop tank to collect the dirty pressure of the cargo oil tank. In this case, the slop tank is equivalent to the cargo tank, and its risk is not improved due to loading. The operation requirement of “collecting tank effluent, tank washing water and other oily mixtures” only appears during the unloading of the tanker and the ballast voyage after the unloading is completed. There are many ways to deal with it and it is not relevant to this issue. Mention again.

In addition, regarding technical risk analysis. At present, in accordance with the requirements of international conventions and regulations, in the design and construction phase of oil tankers, the requirements for slop tanks are equal to or higher than those for cargo tanks, such as double hull protection, size limitation and arrangement, venting arrangement, liquid level measuring device, The heating piping system and the transportation piping system for oily sewage and cargo oil have been fully considered, so there will be no additional risks due to design or technical reasons.