Process optimization and reduction of production costs in modern beet sugar manufacturing

Exploding fuel prices and increasing costs for emission certificates motivate sugar manufacturers to invest in new processes to reduce production costs. A critical part of the optimization is, without any doubt, the reduction of steam consumption of the factory, and the minimization of carbon footprint.

Technological development projects in the EU and worldwide deal mostly with the i) reduction of steam/electricity consumption and ii) environmentally motivated projects. Environmental protection represents a strong driving force for the optimization and technological development in the sugar branch.

The paper summarizes the experience of a long-term development project in two of the best EU beet factories. Unlike conventional sugar factories, one of these plants is already equipped with vapor recompression, thus, suits the trend of using power in sugar manufacture. Some challenging technological improvements have been realized between 2009 and 2022. The experience with optimising process technology and reducing manufacturing costs is described in detail. Two modification packages are presented in simplified form based on engineering tools used for the optimization tasks. Selected projects are structured in terms of investment costs, from moderate and mid-term improvements to strategic investment. The payback and return on investment play a dominant role in this paper.

The most challenging issue is how to reduce the overall energy requirement for the process, concurrently to identify the right technology significantly lowering CO₂-emissions, in a financially viable way.