Sugar Milling Process:
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!Washing: At the mill, sugar cane or beets are thoroughly washed to remove soil and debris. Sugar cane is crushed and washed with hot water, while beets are sliced into thin strips, known as cossettes, and steeped in hot water to begin sugar extraction.
Extraction: For cane, milling presses out the juice from the fibrous bagasse. In the case of beets, extraction occurs in tanks where cossettes are agitated with a rotating shaft to dissolve the sugar.
Juice Purification: The raw juice is purified through sulfitation and carbonation techniques. This involves heating the juice, adding calcium hydroxide, and bubbling CO2 through it to reduce alkalinity. After several filtration stages, the juice is concentrated by evaporation to a sugar content of 50-65%.
Crystallization: In this critical stage, syrup is evaporated under vacuum to supersaturate it with sugar crystals, in a process called seeding. The resulting mixture, known as massecuite, contains both sugar crystals and syrup and is further processed to enhance crystallization.
Centrifugation: The massecuite is spun in high-speed centrifuges to separate the sugar crystals from the molasses.
Drying: The moist sugar crystals are dried with hot air, then processed in a granulator. The final product is sized, packaged, and ready for distribution.
Role of Steam Boilers in Sugar Mills:
Steam boilers are vital during the crystallization and drying stages of sugar processing. They typically run on bagasse, coal, or biomass. Beyond processing, these boilers contribute to power generation in cogeneration plants.