INVESTMENT PROGRAMME
- Construction of a refinery/fractionation plant
- Construction of a new water treatment plant
- Construction of a 30 MT/hour boiler with 2.5 MW turbine
- Construction of a finished products tank farm
At the same time, the mill capacity was upgraded from a 45 MT of FFB/hour to a 60 MT of FFB/hour mill.
1.The refinery/fractionation plant.
In the refinery and fractionation plant, the crude palm oil (CPO) and palm kernel oil (PKO) will be refined, bleached and deodorized (RBD) which will result in a bland product called RBDO or RBD PKO. This product can be sold as such but it can also be fractionated in olein (liquid) and stearin (solid). The olein is sold as cooking oil whilst stearin is used in many products such as bakery goods, margarines, quality soaps, maggi cubes, biscuits, milk, ice cream etc.
The building of the plant is completed with all equipments installed and all the piping done. The foundations for the building were done by a local contractor Krane, whilst the building was erected by another local contractor Amitaab. The piping was done both by Amitaab and Orsam. The structural members were imported from Liebaert, Belgium whilst the equipments for the refinery came from CMB/DBO, Italy. The equipments for the fractionation plant came from Tirtiaux, Belgium.
During the last months before the pre-commissioning, Orsam made a loading bay while Avery provided the weigh bridge. The roads around the plant were constructed by Build-us.
The pre-commissioning of the refinery and fractionation plant took place in December 2007 in the presence of the chairman Mr. Vandebeeck, Honorable Clement Eledi and the Minister of Agriculture, and resulted in the production of high quality RBDO, FFA, olein and stearin.
2. The new water treatment plant.
GOPDC was lucky to find in the vicinity of the mill two new borehole sites which will be able to provide together 45 m3 water per hour. This water is suitable for drinking but not automatically suitable for use in the boilers. In fact, the water from the boreholes needs to go through a series of treatments to become usable in the boilers. Therefore GOPDC has invested in a specialized water treatment plant. The equipments come from Infilco (a member of the Suez group) in France. The foundations for the water treatment plant were done by KOK and the building was assembled by Amitaab.
The scope of supply is a sand filter capable of filtering 35 m3 of raw water per hour, a duplex demineralization plant capable of treating 30 m3 of filtered water per hour, a water softener of 10 m3 per hour and a thermal deaerator for 30 tons of water per hour.
The water treatment plant was commissioned in May 2007.
3. A 30 MT/hour boiler with 2.5 Mega Watt Turbine.
In order to be able to cope with the increased processing capacity of the mill, the steam and power demands of the new refinery and fractionation plant, the rising costs of electricity and fossil fuels, GOPDC has been investing in a 30 MT/hour boiler with 2.5 MW turbine.
The new boiler will produce 30 tons of superheated steam per hour, which will go through a steam turbine to generate enough electricity to serve the mill, refinery/fractionation plant and estate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
GOPDC produces huge amounts of organic waste (like empty fruit bunches, fibres and nut shells), which will now partly serve as fuel for the boiler.
The way GOPDC is handling its waste products has convinced EcoSecurities, an international firm that deals in Carbon Credits, to certify this installation.
This project is a joint engineering project between Siat, CIRAD and Vyncke and the idea is to have similar installations on all the other sites of the Siat group. CICB of India is the supplier of the turbine.
The boiler and turbine were pre-started in May 2007, but the first full capacity test running will take place in the peak season when enough organic waste is available.
4. The finished products tank farm.
The refined and fractionated products need to be stored. Therefore, GOPDC has built a state of the art tank farm of not less than 14 tanks. The current capacity of this tank farm is about 1700 tonnes. This year 1 tank of 300 tonnes olein and 1 daily CPO tank of 150 tonnes will be made to increase the capacity of the tank farm.
Most of the tanks are constructed in stainless steel to assure optimal quality storage. Since refined and fractionated products have a shelf life which is much shorter than the crude products, additional care is taken of the products to keep the quality permanently to our customers’ specifications. When filling the tanks, nitrogen is injected to push away air (oxygen) to stop the natural oxidation of the goods. Stirrers are placed to homogenize the product on a permanent basis. Scanners and temperature probes are installed to check the stocks and to improve the traceability of the products. The tank farm was pre-commissioned in December 2007 in cooperation with Peacs.
5. Tema Tank Farm.
At Tema (harbour), GOPDC is constructing a new tank farm next to the old one. The old tank farm has a capacity of 6000 MT. The new tank farm will consist of 6 tanks with also a capacity of 6000 MT. So far, 2 tanks (capacity each 1000 MT) are constructed and they should be ready for use by March 2008.
Other projects at Tema are:
• The construction of 2 weigh bridges to improve customer services
• The construction of a new inox pipeline system towards the harbour in order to make the whole transfer of oil ‘carbon steel free’
• The renovation of the current pipeline system and the old tank farm, if it becomes necessary
6. Biomethanation plant.
One of the components of the CDM Emission Reductions Purchase Agreement related to the Ghana Oil Palm Methane Recovering and Fuel-Switch Project (see ‘Environmental commitment’) is the installation of the biomethanation plant.
The Kumasi Institute Of Technology and Environment (KITE) and GOPDC have worked out a project called “Facilitating the provision of sustainable energy and environment for rural development”.
The specific objectives of this 4-years project are:
1)reduce the environmental impact of the palm oil mill processing effluent;
2)supply electricity to households in rural areas that are not connected to the national grid;
3)facilitate the establishment of enterprises that use electricity for income generation;
4)facilitate the establishment of sustainable enterprises through the provision of Enterprise Development Support (EDS) and hand-holding.
The European Union has awarded a grant to the Kumasi Institute Of Technology Energy and Environment (KITE), and its co-finance partner GOPDC, for the project.
The bio-methanation plant will be made up of 4 main sections:
• The Bio-conversion Plant (bioreactors, entrance chambers and hydraulic tanks)
• The Digested Sludge Processing/Pasteurization/Stabilization Plant (solar pasteurizer)
• The Bio-fuel gas processing and Storage Plant (gas holders/scrubbers, compressors and gas reservoirs)
• In-Plant Waste Water Treatment Plant
An anaerobic digestion process will take place in the bioreactors which will result in two products: biogas (60 % methane, 40% carbon dioxide) and digested sludge.