BMA involved in upgrade of Kaset Phol plant
At the Kaset Phol cane sugar factory site, located between the cities of Khon Kaen and Udon Thani in the north of Thailand near the border with Laos, a new plant will be built and the factory complex expanded. BMA is in charge of a major part of this project: the new refinery.
Mitsui Sugar Co. Ltd, the Japanese parent company that jointly operates the factory, has set itself two important goals. To increase the processing capacity to 24,000 tcd, by building a new cane sugar plant, with the old factory still in operation. And to build a new refinery at the site, to help meet the growing demand for high-quality refined sugar in Asia. The total investment amounts to about 330m US dollars.
Refinery concept
In July 2017, BMA was commissioned with the refinery design. Its target annual output will be 300,000 tons of refined sugar, based on 300 days of operation per year. The plant will therefore process both freshly produced raw sugar and, at times when the cane sugar factory is idle, stored product.
BMA is responsible for the process engineering of all refinery stations, from the reception of raw sugar from the stores, to the packaging of the end product in units of 1/25/50 kg and 1 t. BMA Automation will be developing the software for the refinery’s automation system, so regular project meetings with the customer have been held on site, at 2-month intervals at most.
Successful collaboration
Once the basic engineering was complete, BMA received the order for the manufacture and supply of the main process equipment. We immediately started on the detailed engineering and the piping engineering. Most of the equipment was built in a joint effort by BMA AG and BMA China.
The shipments reached the construction site between May and August 2019. BMA then sent some of its experts to monitor and coordinate the assembly work. Commissioning of the refinery is scheduled for the third quarter of this year.
Kaset Phol cane sugar factory
Kaset Phol cane sugar factory
The scope of supplies and products from BMA for Kaset Phol includes the following and other items:
- DCS software
- Melter
- Carbonatation tanks
- Evaporators
- Cooling crystalliser for seed massecuite
- Revolving-arm minglers
- Strike receivers
- Batch pans (DVK)
- Drum dryers