Optimize a sugar refinery and reduce production shutdowns

The extraction of beet sucrose is a meticulous process consisting of several steps, the most important of those are:

• extraction
• purification
• evaporation
• and crystallization.

This transformation process is very expensive, the key issue for our customers is the recovery of by-products (syrups, molasses, etc.)

The sugar factories operate by cycle according to the production of beets and must over a given period operate continuously. On this period are scheduled production shutdowns at fixed dates. It is therefore necessary to have robust, efficient equipment that limits clogging.

How is sugar extracted from the beet and what are the steps of this extraction?

1. Beets are harvested, then transported to the sugar refinery.
   


2.  In the refinery the harvest is washed to remove all traces of soil and cut in strips called “cossettes”.
   


3. Those are introduced into a cylinder which they cross in counter-current in water at 70 ° C. The sugar in the cossettes is then extracted and mixed with water to form a sweet juice.
   


4. To separate the sugar from the water, the sweet juice is warmed using a Weplex ® plate exchanger. Then, lime milk (from limestone) is added to our juice. This juice is filtered until the obtention of a clear juice. It is now composed of 13% sugar and 87% water.
   


5. After a second warming, the clear juice is concentrated by evaporation to obtain a syrup that contain 70% sugar.
   


6. Small crystals are added to the mixture to start the crystallization of the sugar.
   


7. The syrup is removed using a centrifuge. The crystals are then sent to hot air dryers.
   


8. Once dry, the sugar is packaged in pieces or in powder.

The Weplex® heat exchanger designed to reduce production shutdowns.

The Weplex® welded plate heat exchanger is ideal and recommended for sugar refinery. Thanks to its large channels and its easy opening, the exchanger is drastically limits clogging as well as production shutdowns and their duration.
It benefits of an increase of robustness thanks to Duplex materials and its thermal efficiency is higher than another exchangers.

The Weplex® exchanger is perfectly suited to:

• Warming juices (loaded with matter in suspension of clogging nature)
• Syrups.
• Molasses having a viscous character.

Reducing maintenance times is a strategic issue for our customers. So, thanks to its innovative design, the Weplex® heat exchanger reduces the frequency of production shutdowns.