Decommissioning
Decommissioning & Equipment Removal for Gas and Cryogenic Facilities
One tank or an entire plant. We coordinate the removal through experienced partners and we find the buyer — so the equipment pays for the work instead of the other way around.
Plants close. Contracts end and the supplier wants their tank back. A facility consolidates and two vaporizer banks become one. A line is upgraded and the old skid has nowhere to go. Sometimes the equipment is simply sitting on a pad costing money to insure.
Whatever brought you here, the first question is usually the same one: is it worth more removed and sold, or should it go with the building? We'll tell you straight, including when the answer is that it isn't worth much.
We're not the demolition crew — and that's deliberate
We work with experienced decommissioning and rigging partners across the United States — companies that do this every week, carry the insurance, and hold the certifications the work requires. We bring in the right one for your site and your equipment, and we stay in the middle, so you deal with one point of contact instead of four.
What we bring that a demolition contractor doesn't is more than forty years in industrial gas and cryogenics, and knowing what the equipment is actually worth. A vacuum-insulated vessel with a good annulus and intact paperwork can be worth many times its scrap weight, and a crew pricing by the ton has no reason to know that. That difference usually pays for the removal, and often more.
What we handle
Full turnkey decommissioning
The whole project, from the first walk-through to a swept floor. Isolation and lockout, purging and warm-up, disconnection, rigging, removal, transport, and the paperwork that closes the site out — run by a partner equipped for it, with us managing the schedule and handling the equipment side. Right when a site is closing entirely, or when nobody on your team has the bandwidth to run it.
Tank removal
Stationary vessels of any code stamp — ASME storage, process tanks, receivers. Foundation and anchor-bolt disconnection, piping tie-in capping, rigging and haul-off. Right when you need a specific asset gone and the rest of the plant keeps running.
Cryogenic tank removal
Bulk LIN, LOX, LAR, LNG and CO₂ storage, and the vaporizers, piping and telemetry that go with them. This isn't the same job as pulling a water tank and it shouldn't be priced like one — which is why we match it to a partner who has done it before rather than whoever is available. Right for supplier tank recovery, contract end, and site consolidation.
Cryogenic equipment removal
Everything around the tank. Vaporizers, pumps, cold boxes, ISO containers, trailers, microbulk, liquid cylinders, transfer piping and controls. Right when a system is coming out rather than a single vessel.
High pressure gas equipment removal
Tube trailers, ground storage, cascade systems, compressors, skids and manifold banks. Requalification status and code stamp drive both the removal plan and the value, so we check the dates before anything is quoted. Right for CNG, hydrogen, helium, and industrial gas fill plants.
Not sure which you need?
Most people aren't, and it isn't your job to know. Tell us what's on the pad and roughly what you're trying to achieve, and we'll work out the rest.
What makes gas and cryogenic different
Any of these can change what a vessel is worth, or whether it can be moved at all. A contractor who works mainly in general industry has no reason to know them.
Vacuum is the value
A vacuum-insulated vessel that looks perfect can be close to worthless if the annulus has gone soft, and it isn't something that can be put right on site. We want a vacuum reading before anyone puts a number on it — yours or ours.
The data plate is the title deed
A vessel with a missing or illegible nameplate is worth a fraction of the same vessel with its National Board number and U-1A intact. Find the paperwork before you find a buyer.
Prior service decides the next service
A tank that has been in LIN can often go to LOX. One that has been in CO₂ or flammable service can't be converted to oxygen at all. Product history isn't a footnote, it's a valuation input.
Warm-up takes days, not hours
A bulk vessel has to be emptied, warmed and purged before it moves, and on a large tank that's a multi-day job with dry nitrogen. Anyone who tells you they'll have it on a truck tomorrow hasn't done this.
Requalification is a clock
A tube trailer or transport past its hydro date can't legally be filled or offered for transport. Time to next retest moves the price, and a listing without it is incomplete.
Oversize by default
Large-diameter assets that usually have to stay upright, with lift points that matter because the outer jacket is a vacuum boundary rather than a structural shell. Route surveys, permits and escorts are normal here, not exceptions.
Do you actually own it?
A bulk tank on your pad very often isn't yours. Most are owned by the gas supplier under a product supply agreement, and that contract usually governs who removes it and when. Before anything else, check whether the asset is owned, leased, or supplied — and whether the agreement has ended. If you're not sure, tell us and we'll help you work it out.
What to gather before you call
Half of this is readable straight off a nameplate. If you have none of it, send photos anyway.
- •A readable photo of the data plate
- •National Board number and U-1A form
- •MAWP and design temperature
- •Manufacturer, model, serial, year built
- •Last product in service — and anything before that
- •Last hydro or requalification date
- •Relief valve certification dates
- •Vacuum reading, if the gauge is there
- •Capacity, dimensions, orientation
- •Photos showing crane access to the installation
- •Anything you already know is wrong with it
Selling quietly
Selling equipment tells people things. A tank coming off a pad is visible evidence of a contract change to every competitor in the region, and evidence of trouble to your customers. If you're publicly traded, it can land somewhere you didn't choose.
None of which changes the fact that the equipment is idle and worth money. Tick the confidential box on the form below and nothing about it reaches the marketplace without speaking to you first — specs without your name, detail released only under NDA, or kept off the market entirely. You can also name anyone who mustn't be shown it, and set a date before which nothing goes live.
Tell us what you have
We'll come back with what it's likely worth removed and what removal involves.
Common questions
Is it worth removing, or should it stay with the building?
Depends on the asset. A cryogenic vessel with its documentation intact and a good vacuum is frequently worth more than the cost of taking it out. A tank with no data plate, a soft vacuum, or an expired requalification often isn't. We'll tell you which one you have before you spend anything.
Who actually does the work?
An experienced decommissioning and rigging partner, matched to your site and your equipment. We're not the crew — we run the equipment side and manage the project, which means you deal with one company instead of four.
Why not just call a demolition company directly?
You can, and for some equipment that's the right answer. The difference is what happens to the asset. A crew pricing by the ton has no reason to know that a vessel with a good vacuum and its U-1A intact is worth many times its scrap weight — so it leaves as scrap. Behind everything on this page is more than forty years in industrial gas and cryogenics: we know what it's worth, and we know who buys it. That difference usually covers the removal on its own.
Can you handle a whole plant?
Yes — that's what full turnkey decommissioning covers. Complete air separation units, CO₂ plants and fill plants are a different scale of project than a single vessel, and they get a partner equipped for that scale.
What does it cost?
It depends on access, crane requirements, what has to be purged, and how far it has to travel. On a lot of gas and cryogenic equipment the sale proceeds offset the removal cost or exceed it. We'll show you both numbers rather than one.