If I disconnect the steam storage tank from acid neutralization chemplants, the tank indeed empties in about 21s.
It's just that one acid neutralization chemplant produces 2k steam per second, so 8 chemplants produce 16k steam per second, and they will fill an empty tank very quickly, certainly ...

I understand the set up may not be optimal. However, a lack of supply doesn't seem to be the issue. I have steam sitting in the tank, and in the outbound slots of each steam producing chemical plant. However, the downstream chem plants are starved for steam. I would not expect that to happen while ...

Attached is the save file. The pump in question is on vulcanus, at the steam storage tank (south west).

Hello,

I have a fluid tank with 25K steam and one incoming pipe that only generates steam.

On the other side I have a pump (set to enabled at steam > 5K).

I put a T-intersection at the pump exit.
The north branch leads to plants which are mostly full and barely run.
The south branch leads to ...