The Snyder Industries 16500 Gallon HDPE Vertical Liquid Storage Tank is a Lincoln, Nebraska-built bulk polyethylene vessel with a 1.9 specific gravity structural rating, which means its wall is built to carry liquids denser than plain water. At 16,500 gallons it stands 257 inches tall on a 142 by 142 inch footprint, so the pad and the site clearance need to be planned around a vertical tank that is well over 21 feet tall before you ever add a fitting or a ladder. This is the kind of HDPE storage tank operators reach for when they need real bulk volume in a single white polyethylene vessel.
Will it work for your site?
This is a white HDPE vertical storage tank with a 1.9 specific gravity rating, which is the number that matters most when you spec it. Filled with water it holds about 137,610 pounds of liquid; loaded to its full rated 1.9 SG contents it carries up to 261,459 pounds. The 1.9 rating is not just a caution — it is the structural headroom you are paying for. A lighter 1.5 SG wall is built around water-weight service, while this wall is rated to carry denser liquids and heavier brine-type service without stepping up to a different tank. That rated weight, not the gallon figure, is what drives your foundation. Above-ground polyethylene tanks of this size need an engineered, level concrete pad, and our concrete pad sizing guide using the ACI 360R-10 framework walks through the structural boundary between a slab-on-grade pour and an engineered foundation. Hand your pad engineer the two loads over the 142 by 142 inch (about 140 square foot) footprint — 137,610 pounds full of water, 261,459 pounds at full 1.9 SG — so the bearing pressure is sized to the worst case, not the average. To confirm this 16,500-gallon size is right for your throughput and refill cycle before you commit, run the numbers through our Tank Sizing Calculator and the Tank Sizing Guide.
The mistake to avoid
The 1.9 SG rating tells you the heaviest liquid the tank wall is built to hold, but it is a structural number only. It does not by itself mean a given liquid is chemically compatible with HDPE; chemical resistance is a separate question that depends on the resin and, just as critically, on the fitting and gasket materials. The fitting and gasket elastomers are the wetted parts that most often fail first, so for any non-water service the fitting and gasket spec has to be confirmed for your stored liquid before the tank is built — confirm chemical compatibility with the manufacturer at order time. The other common miss on a tank this tall is the headspace: on large vertical HDPE tanks the wall section at the vapor-saturated top is where premature failures tend to originate, and our guide on HDPE wall thickness and ASTM D1998 sizing logic explains why a liquid-side inspection alone can miss it.
Fittings, access, and delivery
Outlet, inlet, and manway configuration are not fixed on this size — they are confirmed at order, so call 866-418-1777 to spec your fitting and manway layout along with the gasket material for your service. Plan the site for the tank's real envelope, too: overhead clearance well beyond the 257-inch standing height, a level 142-inch-square engineered pad, and crane or boom access to offload a vessel that ships on its own dedicated truck. Getting clearance and offload access settled before the truck arrives is what keeps a tank this size from sitting on the trailer.
Fire-water and reuse applications
A 16,500-gallon reserve is a natural fit for a rural fire-water reservoir or an industrial water-reuse train. If this tank is feeding a private fire-protection stack, our fire-water reservoir design guide covers NFPA 22 sizing discipline and cold-climate freeze protection. For grey-water, rainwater, or HVAC condensate aggregation, the industrial water-reuse tank topology guide covers quality-banded storage trains and treatment-stage sequencing.
This tank ships LTL freight from the Snyder plant in Lincoln, Nebraska, and given the size it ships on its own truck. Freight is quoted live to your ZIP code rather than included in the list price. Get a freight quote to your ZIP with our Freight Cost Estimator, or call 866-418-1777 to talk through pad requirements, fitting placement, and delivery access for a tank this size.
