May 17, 2021

Vincent has participated in an interesting process and product development program in Raceland, Louisiana. Our customer, Virdia, operated a pilot facility there which focused on extracting a sugar, xylose, from sugar cane bagasse.

Primary financing for Virdia came from their parent company, Stora Enso. Stora Enso is a pulp and paper manufacturer headquartered in Helsinki, Finland, with significant operations on four continents. Their investment in Virdia was part of a program to diversify into new growth areas. The focus of these investments is to develop new products based on renewable materials. Unfortunately, after several years of hard and diligent work, it has been concluded that the xylose project does not have long term sustainability.

Xylose is a specialty sugar used in chewing gum, toothpaste, and mouthwash. Two VP-30 screw presses were used to process the cane bagasse. These had 150 hp motors, turning the screws at 12 rpm at 60 Hertz. The preferred screen was perforated, with 3/32″ holes.

The feed to these presses was 300 tons per day of bagasse. This came from a sugar mill located across the highway from the pilot plant. Ahead of the press, the first step was to wash out the ash. The bagasse went from 9%-15% ash to 3%. Then they processed the bagasse, after which the flow was run through our VP-30’s. The press liquor was a yellow liquid, which was converted into a from of xylose crystals as it cooled.

The press cake had lignin and glucose. This was treated and run through a KP-24 press. This press had a 75 hp motor and ran at 22 rpm at 60 Hertz. The screen was perforated, with 0.050″ holes.

The lignin was dried out. They had an unusual market for it: pitch was added to it and they made electrodes for electric arc furnaces. These were a substitute for carbon rods. The lignin rods lasted two weeks, which was good.

Their glucose was similar to the glucose from a wheat milling operation.

ISSUE #334