What varieties of root crops make a sweet product? Sugar business, how to set up your own sugar factory

Sugar production technology is a multi-level chain, which consists of several stages:

Washing and cleaning of raw materials from impurities;
- obtaining sugar beet shavings;
- production of diffusion juice and its purification;
- obtaining syrup;
- isolation from sugar syrup;
- processing of sugar mass into granulated sugar;
- packaging and storage of the finished product.

Washing and cleaning

With impurities in it, they make up to 12% of the total mass, and in addition to the earth and tops, the impurities may contain stones and even some metal objects. All this must be separated from the useful part of the fruit. To wash beets, a drum washer and a water separator equipped with traps for impurities are used. Properly performed washing will avoid damage to subsequent equipment for the production of sugar.

Production of sugar from sugar beet - obtaining sugar beet shavings

In accordance with the technology of sugar production, in order to produce syrup, beets must be crushed. Shredding of beets is the process of turning them into shavings on beet cutters, which, with the help of diffusion knives mounted on frames, cut the fruits into small pieces. Chip thickness of 1 mm is the optimal thickness for further processing.

Inside the body of the beet cutter, the fruits rotate with the help of a snail, which, under the action of centrifugal force, presses the fruits against the cutting edge of the knives. In the process of sliding along the fixed knives, the beets turn into shavings, which, passing between the knives, fall into a container for further processing. Of all sugar production equipment, beet cutters require the most difficult cleaning with compressed air, and the periodic replacement of knives.

Production of diffusion juice

The process of extracting sucrose from beets using sugar production technology is quite primitive - beet chips are soaked in hot water in industrial diffusers, which softens its fibers and releases juice. If you use cold water, then the protein compounds in the cells of the chips will significantly slow down the process of obtaining juice.

Usually several diffusers are used in series to produce more concentrated juice. For further processing, diffusion juice must be cleaned of beet chips that have become useless. A mixture of juice and chips is placed in pulp traps, where filtration takes place.

Diffusion juice, even purified from fruit residues, remains a complex multicomponent composition, which, in addition to sugar, also contains protein, pectin, amino acids, and so on. With the help of vacuum filters and saturators, the process of cleaning sugar syrup from impurities is carried out.

Separation of sugar from syrup

The sugar syrup obtained after purification of the juice contains too much water (up to 75%), which is removed in the evaporator, obtaining a syrup containing up to 70% solids. After that, according to the technology of sugar production, using a vacuum apparatus, the syrup is thickened to a solids content of 93.5%, obtaining a massecuite, which, after undergoing the crystallization process, will become ordinary sugar.

Sugar crystallization is the final stage of the technological process of sugar production

The massecuite obtained from vacuum machines is sent to a centrifuge, where it crystallizes, after which it is dried with hot air and sent through a vibrating conveyor to a drying-cooling plant, after which it is sorted using a vibrating screen.

Despite the rather long technological chain, most of the equipment for the production of sugar has a fairly simple principle of operation. The simple principle of operation of individual devices facilitates both maintenance and repair of all types of necessary equipment, which makes it possible to produce sugar on an industrial scale at a fairly low cost.

After the beets have been removed from the field and delivered to the plant, the process of obtaining granulated sugar begins.

After the beets have been removed from the field and delivered to the plant, the process of obtaining granulated sugar begins.
First you need to clean the raw materials from the tops, straw, sand, slag and stones. Their presence makes it difficult to obtain beet chips and blunts knives. The incoming beets are accumulated in a reinforced concrete tank, which is equipped with various traps to remove various impurities that will interfere with the operation of the mechanisms. After the sorted beets enter the elevator to the beet cutters, they must be washed. They do this in order to keep the knives from becoming blunt and to prevent contamination of the diffusion juice.

For additional cleaning of root crops, beet washers are used, because the dirt is washed off better when the fruits rub against each other. For this, a drum-type beet washer is used, here the roots are washed by 70%, then they go to the rinser. After this procedure, the beets are cleaned with a hydro-stone sand trap. Clean beets enter the screw conveyors. Sugar losses in these processes depend on the season and the quality of the product. The washed beets enter the bunker and then to the beet cutters. To get sugar from beets, it is given the appearance of chips, this method is called diffusion. The thickness of normal chips should be 0.5-1 mm. On good diffusion devices, high-quality chips are obtained, which should not mix during mixing, but move. The temperature during this process should be optimal even in the absence of air.

The diffusion apparatus must have the following parameters:
1. For 100 grams of chips 12 millimeters;
2. 0.3% loss of sugar to the mass of beets in pulp;
3. 120% of the pumping juice relative to the mass of beets;
4. Chips should be in the machine for 100 minutes;
5. The temperature in the apparatus is optimal.

This is followed by the process of purification of the juice obtained by diffusion, which contains sucrose and other sugars that prevent the production of sucrose in a crystalline form - which means that they need to get rid of. For this, physico-chemical purification processes are used. The easiest way to clean is to use lime. Lime is introduced into the juice heated to 90 degrees, and with countercurrent movement, lime allows you to completely precipitate substances that are not amenable to crystallization.

The resulting juice is then thickened by evaporation.
Sugar crystallization considered as the final step. Pure sucrose is isolated from a mixture called syrup. Part of the sucrose is converted into granulated sugar, and part remains in molasses. Therefore, the yield of sugar depends on losses in molasses.

The last step in sugar production is drying. Sugar is dried to remove unwanted moisture from it. For drying, it comes at a temperature of about 50 degrees and with a moisture content of 1.2%. Still wet sugar enters the dryer and is dried with hot air at about 105 degrees, then cooled to 20 degrees. Dried and cooled sugar enters a special sieving machine, and then to packaging. The moisture content of the sugar should match the humidity in the storage.

Sugar - a food product obtained mainly from sugar beet and sugar cane. Available in the form of granulated sugar and refined sugar. Calorie content of 100 g of sugar is about 400 kcal. The most important indicator of the quality of sugar is its color, which in Stammer units should not exceed 1.0.

Regardless of the raw material, the sensation of sweetness of sugar is determined solely by the size of the surface of the crystals and, therefore, the speed of melting in the mouth. Slowly melting large crystals seem not sweet enough, while small ones and especially powdered sugar have a cloyingly sweet taste.

Sugar beet- a biennial plant from the haze family. In the first year of its development, from the initially sown seeds, juicy, sugar-rich root crops are formed with a widely grown shank, lateral roots and a powerful basal rosette of leaves - tops, but without flowers and seeds. It is these roots, after trimming the tops (together with the upper part of the root head), as well as removing the shank and part of the roots, that serve as raw materials for sugar beet production. The average yield of root crops is 25...40 t/ha, on irrigated lands of Ukraine - over 60 t/ha.

Formation of sugar in beets occurs by the initial synthesis under the action of sunlight of the simplest carbohydrates (glucose and fructose) from carbon dioxide and water in plant leaves containing chlorophyll.

Mass digging of root crops is carried out from the second half of September. The beets delivered by vehicles are stored in heaps (piles) before processing. To prevent putrefactive processes, beets in heaps are sprayed with milk of lime, and in hot weather they are irrigated with water.

Root crops in heaps continue to live, consuming oxygen from the air and releasing carbon dioxide, as well as water vapor.

Pressed cane juice is subjected to chemical purification with a small amount of lime, phosphoric acid and sulfur dioxide. In a filtered form, it enters the evaporator plant. After thickening, the syrup from the residue is boiled down until sugar crystals are isolated, which are separated in centrifuges in the form of raw sugar.

Factories that produce sugar are large, equipped with high-performance production technology. The capacity of individual sugar beet processing plants reaches 6...9 thousand tons per day, and on average - 2.5 thousand tons per day. Beet sugar production - mass, in-line. In it, in a single production flow, the main technological processes and intermediate operations for the processing of beets are carried out with the production of one type of mass marketable product - white granulated sugar. By-products of marketable products are pulp and molasses.

To protect sucrose from decomposition, all technological processes are carried out at a temperature not exceeding 90 ... 100 ° C (only in the first evaporation chambers up to 120 ... 125 ° C), and in an alkaline environment (with the exception of the slightly acidic reaction of diffuse juice).

The duration of the production cycle from the receipt of beets to the receipt of raw white sugar is no more than 12 ... 16 hours, and taking into account the processing of all molasses and yellow sugars in the grocery department - 36 ... 42 hours.

The most important stages of sugar production technology from beets are as follows:

acceptance, storage and supply of beets to the plant;
cleaning the roots of beets from the ground and impurities;
grinding (cutting) beets into shavings and extracting juice from it in a diffuse way; juice purification; evaporating water from the juice to obtain a syrup; boiling the syrup into a crystalline mass - massecuite I and subsequent separation of this mass by centrifugation into white crystalline sugar and molasses; boiling molasses into massecuite II, its additional crystallization and centrifugation to obtain yellow sugar and final molasses - a waste product when working according to the scheme with two massecuites.

Purification (affination) of the last yellow sugar, dissolution of yellow sugars in juice (clearing) with the return of the resulting solution - clerks for cleaning the syrup.

In addition to these technological operations, auxiliary processes are carried out: obtaining lime and saturation (carbon dioxide) gas necessary for purification of juice by burning sulfur of sulfite (sulphurous) gas to purify juice and syrup.

At some plants, additional technological operations are carried out, which are, as it were, a continuation of the main production processes - drying beet pulp and producing animal feed based on it (enriching the pulp with additives), obtaining citric acid from molasses microbiologically.

All technological operations are carried out in three main departments of the plant: beet processing, including the supply of beets to the plant; juice cleaning, including evaporation and production of lime, saturation and sulfate gases; product - cooking and crystallization and whitening.

Extraction of sugar from sugar beet chips

The extraction of sugar from sugar beet chips is carried out by leaching with warm water and diffusion juice and is based on the phenomena of diffusion and osmosis through the permeable walls of sugar beet cells.

Leaching occurs in diffusion batteries, consisting of 12 - 16 diffusers. diffusers, which are metal cylinders with a capacity of 5-10 m 3 , equipped with devices for loading chips and unloading pulp. The contents of the diffusers are heated by steam circulating through the pipes inside the diffuser. The temperature in the diffuser reaches 60 °C or more. At this temperature, the protoplasm of cells coagulates, which facilitates the leaching of sugar from them.

The leaching of sugar in the diffusion battery is carried out gradually. diffusion juice, moving from one diffuser to another, it is gradually saturated with sugar until the sugar content in the juice approaches as close as possible to the sugar content of beets.

The first diffuser of the battery is loaded with chips and filled with warm water, which fills the entire space between the chips in the diffuser.

If the sugar content of freshly loaded beet chips is 18% (it can be a little more or less), then after leaching some of the sugar with water and achieving diffusion equilibrium, the sugar in the chips and water is distributed equally and the sugar content of the chips and the resulting juice becomes the same: it is 9% ( 18:2).

The juice obtained in the first diffuser is transferred to the second, loaded with fresh shavings. Upon reaching diffusion equilibrium, the sugar in the chips and juice in the second diffuser is distributed equally, and the sugar content of the juice is 13.5% ((18+9)/2).

From the second diffuser, the juice is transferred to the third, also filled with fresh shavings. The sugar content of the juice in it reaches 15.75% ((18 + 13.5) / 2), etc. In the last diffuser, the sugar content of the juice differs little from the sugar content of fresh beet chips.

Since 9% of sugar remains in the chips in the first diffuser (only 9 of the 18% contained in fresh chips goes into the juice), to extract the sugar, it is refilled with clean water.

By establishing diffusion equilibrium in the first diffuser, juice is again obtained, although with a lower sugar content: (9: 2 = 4.5%). This juice is then transferred to a second diffuser where the sugar content of the chips is 13.5%. Diffusion juice is obtained here with a sugar content of 9% ((13, 5 + 4.5) / 2). Transferring this juice to the third diffuser, where the sugar content of the chips is 15.75%, juice is obtained with a sugar content of 12.37%, etc.

Thus, when the operation of the diffusion battery is set, the most concentrated juice is served on fresh beet chips, and either low concentration juice or pure water is served on more or less sugar-free chips.

In this way, it is possible to extract sugar from beet chips as much as possible and obtain a high-concentration diffusion juice. The loss of sugar in the pulp in this case is only 0.2 - 0.25%.

The movement of juice from one diffuser to another is carried out due to the slight pressure created when pumping water into the first diffuser.

Recently, diffusion apparatuses have been used in sugar factories. continuous action replacement diffusion batteries, loaded and unloaded periodically.

On the one hand, beet chips are continuously fed into the operating diffusion apparatus, which moves towards the water coming from the opposite side. Water continuously washing the chips leaches sugar from it and gradually turns into a sugar-enriched diffusion juice, which is removed from the diffusion apparatus. Desugared shavings - pulp - are also continuously removed from the apparatus.

Diffusion Juice Purification

In addition to sugar, diffusion juice contains (approximately 2%) other substances called non-sugars(salts of phosphoric and other acids, proteins), as well as small suspended particles that give the juice a dark color.

Purification of diffusion juice from suspended particles and a significant part of non-sugars is carried out with the help of lime, and carbon dioxide is used for the subsequent removal of lime from the juice. Lime and carbon dioxide are obtained at sugar refineries by roasting limestone (CaCO 3 \u003d CaO + CO 2); its consumption is 5-6% of the weight of the processed beets.

Processing of diffusion juice with lime (in the form of milk of lime) is carried out in cylindrical boilers with agitators - defecators. Under the action of lime, non-sugars coagulate and precipitate or decompose, forming calcium salts that remain in solution.

Lime-treated (defecated) juice enters saturator, where it is treated with carbon dioxide. Under the action of carbon dioxide, lime turns into calcium carbonate CaCO 3, which, precipitating, carries with it non-sugar.

The carbonated (saturated) juice is filtered for mechanical filters. At the same time, filter-press mud containing calcium carbonate, non-sugar and a small amount of sugar (up to 1% of the weight of the mud) is separated from the juice.

The purified diffusion juice retains a dark color, which is eliminated during the subsequent processing of the juice with sulfur dioxide (it is obtained by burning sulfur). The process of treating juice with sulfur dioxide is called sulfitation.

Evaporation of juice, boiling syrup and obtaining sugar

Purified juice goes to evaporation plant, where most of the water is removed from it. The juice acquires the concentration of syrup (65% solids, including 60% sugar and 5% non-sugars remaining in the diffusion juice after its purification).

The resulting syrup is again bleached with sulfur dioxide and filtered, after which it is boiled in vacuum devices. Boiling the syrup continues for 2.5 - 3 hours at a temperature of about 75 ° C (under vacuum). In the process of boiling, crystallization of sugar occurs. This results in a product containing 55 - 60% of sugar crystals and is called massecuite of the first crystallization. The concentration of solids in the massecuite reaches 92.5% (of which approximately 85% is sugar).

From the vacuum apparatus, the massecuite is lowered into the mixer, and then sent to centrifuges, where the mother liquor is separated from the sugar crystals. The separated mother liquor is called green molasses. It also contains a significant amount of sugar, as well as non-sugar.

After removing the green molasses, the sugar remaining in the centrifuge is washed with water and steamed. As a result, the sugar turns white. When sugar crystals are washed in a centrifuge, a liquid containing dissolved sugar - white molasses. It is returned to vacuum apparatus for additional boiling on the massecuite of the first crystallization, giving white sugar.

Sugar from the centrifuges is sent to the drying drum. Dried sugar is already a completely finished product - granulated sugar containing up to 99.75% pure sugar, counting on dry matter.

Green molasses is also sent to vacuum apparatus for boiling massecuite of the second crystallization. At the same time, they receive yellow sugar, going mainly to the confectionery industry. With special processing, yellow sugar can also be turned into ordinary white sugar.

After isolating the second crystallization of yellow sugar from the massecuite, one obtains feed molasses, or molasses being a waste product. The yield of fodder molasses is about 5% of the weight of the processed beets.

Taking into account the losses of sugar in the production process (most of all it is lost in fodder molasses - 9 - 14% of sugar contained in beets), its output from beets is practically 12 - 13%. At the same time, the consumption of beets per 1 ton of sugar exceeds 7–8 tons.

The process of sugar refining uses a lot of steam and hot water, usually obtained in a factory boiler plant. The total reference fuel consumption at sugar beet factories (including the cost of limestone roasting) is 11-12% of the weight of the processed beet.

Beet sugar production is characterized by high water consumption for technological processes. It is 20 times the weight of processed beets. Taking into account the use of recycled water, the consumption of fresh water is also very significant and reaches 8 tons per 1 ton of beets.

Waste use.

The most valuable waste of sugar beet production is feed molasses, almost half sugar and also contains other nutrients. As a result, molasses is used as a concentrated feed for livestock (by direct feeding or as part of compound feed). In addition, feed molasses is processed into alcohol, yeast, citric and lactic acid and other products.

By special processing of fodder molasses, it is possible to extract the sugar contained in it and thereby increase its overall yield from beets and reduce its cost. For this purpose, workshops have been built at some sugar factories, in which fodder molasses is desugared.

Another waste is pulp - sugar-free beet chips. The pulp unloaded from the diffusers is transported with water to storage facilities (pulp pits). The beet pulp is nutritious, and animals willingly eat it, it is used in animal husbandry for fattening livestock. Some sugar factories also have their own livestock feed stations.

Fresh pulp contains up to 94% water. To increase the transportability, as well as the nutritional value of the pulp, it is partially dehydrated and thereby increases the dry matter content in it to 15 - 18%. For long-term storage, the pulp is dried to a moisture content of 10 - 12%, using flue gases for drying.

Seasonality of sugar beet factories

Sugar beet factories are distinguished by a pronounced seasonality of work. Sugar beet ripens, as a rule, in the second decade of September. At this time, they begin digging and transporting it to factories and processing. The factories create a stock of beets, stacked in heaps, which are processed after its digging and hauling. With prolonged storage of beets, its sugar content is significantly reduced. Therefore, factories tend to process the annual supply of raw materials in the shortest possible time - 3-4 months. Extending the shelf life of beets reduces the yield of sugar per unit of raw material and reduces the profitability of the beet sugar plant.

Refined sugar production

About 20 ... 25% of the produced granulated sugar is subjected to refining in order to obtain a purer food product in solid (lump refined) or friable crystalline (refined granulated sugar) form.

For industrial processing (for refining), granulated sugar with a moisture content of not more than 0.15%, a sugar content of at least 99.75% and a color of up to 1.8 Stammer units is allowed.

The essence of the sugar refining process is that granulated sugar is dissolved, the resulting syrup is purified and boiled into a crystal.

After casting the refined massecuite into molds and cooling it, sugar of high hardness is obtained - poured sugar. Large pieces of poured sugar are broken into smaller ones or sawn into pieces of regular shape.

Another method for the production of lump sugar is also used - pressing moistened granulated sugar obtained from refined massecuite in molds. So get pressed sugar, less hard than cast.

Liquid refined sugar is used in the baking industry and ice cream production.

The color of refined sugar should be pure white, without spots, a bluish tint is allowed, obtained by adding ultramarine.

The yield of finished refined sugar is about 98.5% by weight of the granulated sugar taken into production. Sugar refineries in Odessa, Sumy and Cherkassy operate all year round.

On average in the industry, the annual yield of sugar is 12 ... 13% by weight of beets, therefore, 7 ... 8 parts of beets are consumed per 1 part of the produced sugar.

The labor input for sugar beet processing is 15…16 man-days per 100 tons of beets.

The total consumption of normal steam (with an average heat content of 2700 kJ / kg) in the plant is 50 ... 60% by weight of beets.

The total turnover of water is 1800…2000% by weight of processed beets, it can be reduced to 150…300%.

Attachments: from 3 500 000 rubles

Payback: from 1 month

In the food industry, there are several branches of production with high profitability: almost all people use the products. One of the areas of promising business is the production of sugar from sugar beets. Consider the benefits and risks of such a business and calculate the possible costs.

business concept

According to statistical studies, any resident of our state consumes about 20 kilograms of sugar per year. The product is in constant demand, and if sugar production is established as a business, it will bring high income.

More than 90% of sugar in Russia is produced from imported raw materials. Its prices are quite high.

If you use local raw materials, you can significantly benefit from the difference in selling prices.

Such production requires a decent start-up capital. You need to buy expensive equipment and hire skilled workers. There are two ways to set up a business:

Buy a ready-made plant. You immediately get an established production with high capacity, infrastructure and often well-established supply chains. However, maximum caution is required, because sometimes collapsing buildings with outdated equipment are offered. To avoid this situation, use the services of a competent appraiser.
Buy or rent the necessary premises and assemble the production workshop yourself from a variety of machines and assemblies. For a novice businessman, this is the most suitable way.

You can sell products in bulk to hypermarkets, confectionery factories, catering establishments and canning factories.

Additional profit will be brought by the sale of industrial waste: cake, molasses and molasses. They are sold to suppliers of raw materials or through trade.

What is required for implementation

The future workshop must comply with the standards for the production of food products. Its area is selected based on future production volumes. On average, it is 80-100 square meters. The premises are subdivided into the workshop itself, storage compartments for raw materials and finished products, recreation and hygiene areas for workers.

This production requires the following equipment:

washing;
hydraulic conveyor;
unit for lifting raw material;
cake dryer;
screw press;
diffusion aggregates;
cutting machines;
separator conveyors;
settling tanks;
filtration devices;
evaporating structure;
centrifuges;
dryers and coolers;
vibrating sieve and vibroconveyor.

The line is served by 8 workers. In addition to them, a specialist in the purchase of raw materials and the sale of goods, a storekeeper, and a cleaner are needed.

Step by step start instructions

First, the entrepreneur needs to formalize the production. The best choice is an LLC, which allows you to cooperate with large clients, which will increase financial benefits. But at first, you can register individual entrepreneurship. Taxation system USN (income minus expenses), OKVED 10.81.11.

You also need to obtain permission from the fire and sanitary services, certificates of product quality and production level.

Processing beets into sugar is a process that takes place in several phases:

Purification of raw material.
Grinding. A special unit with sharply sharpened knives is used. Chopped beets are easier to process in the future.
Juice extraction using a diffusion plant.
Juice purification and clarification. In special devices, the juice is filtered from the sediment.
Juice thickening. At the evaporating unit, the concentration of sugar in the raw material rises to 60-75%.
Obtaining sugar crystals. In vacuum devices, the syrup is processed and massecuite is obtained - crystallized sugar.
Subsequent processing of the massecuite and the isolation of white sugar in a centrifuge.

In the production process, in addition to sugar, molasses, cake and filter cake are formed. The first product can be used in the manufacture of alcohol, citric acid, animal feed. Fertilizers are made from the filtered sediment. Cake is used as the basis for the manufacture of animal feed. All this can serve as an additional source of income.

Financial calculations

Before starting production, all preliminary calculations must be made in the business plan. With proper planning, you can avoid serious mistakes at the beginning of work.

Starting capital and monthly expenses

The main part of the initial investment will be spent on the purchase of a production line and the purchase of raw materials. If you plan to open an enterprise with a daily capacity of about 100 tons, you need to make at least 10,000,000 rubles in the expense item for the purchase of equipment. A mini-plant in the basic configuration costs about 1,200,000. But it will not “raise” more than 10 tons per day.

In addition, it is necessary to take into account the following costs (in rubles):

paperwork - 50,000;
rent of premises for the first month - 10,000;
wages to workers for the same period - 150,000;
purchase of raw materials (at an average price of 5,000 rubles per ton) - 2,000,000;
expenses for the purchase of a cash register and online accounting - 30,000;
transport and contingencies - 40,000;
website creation and promotions - 20,000.

In total, at the start, the entrepreneur needs to have 3,500,000 rubles. Monthly expenses will include additional purchase of raw materials, rent, wages, transport and contingencies. They will amount to at least 1,000,000 rubles.

How much can you earn and payback periods

Beet sugar at wholesale costs an average of 35 rubles per kilo. If 10 tons of products are produced daily, then 220 tons of sugar come out for 22 shifts per month. If you manage to sell everything and do without losses, then you will gain 7,700,000 rubles. With a competent approach to the supply of raw materials and marketing, the company is able to pay off in one month.

Advantages and possible risks

The sugar business has both pros and cons. The main disadvantage can be considered that a small plant will have to be opened in places where raw materials are grown, otherwise you can go broke on transport costs.

Additionally, you can master the manufacture of refined sugar in the form of cubes or curly sweets in the form of stars, hearts, circles. Sugar figurines are also used as confectionery decorations.

The production of sugar from beets is a highly profitable business. If you establish the work of the enterprise and can sell products, the profit will be very decent.

Sugar is a food product derived primarily from sugar beet and sugar cane. Available in the form of granulated sugar and refined sugar. Calorie content of 100 g of sugar is about 400 kcal. The most important indicator of the quality of sugar is its color, which in Stammer units should not exceed 1.0.
Regardless of the raw material, the sensation of sweetness of sugar is determined solely by the size of the surface of the crystals and, therefore, the speed of melting in the mouth. Slowly melting large crystals seem not sweet enough, while small ones and especially powdered sugar have a cloyingly sweet taste.

Sugar beet- a biennial plant from the haze family. In the first year of its development, from the initially sown seeds, juicy, sugar-rich root crops are formed with a widely grown shank, lateral roots and a powerful basal rosette of leaves - tops, but without flowers and seeds. It is these roots, after trimming the tops (together with the upper part of the root head), as well as removing the shank and part of the roots, that serve as raw materials for sugar beet production. The average yield of root crops is 25...40 t/ha, on irrigated lands of Ukraine - over 60 t/ha.
The sugar content in beets is 16 ... 18% by weight of the root, sometimes under favorable conditions - 20%. The duration of the growing season ranges from 150 to 180 days. The sum of average daily temperatures during the growing season is 2400…2800°C, sufficient moisture is required.

Formation of sugar in beets occurs by the initial synthesis under the action of sunlight of the simplest carbohydrates (glucose and fructose) from carbon dioxide and water in plant leaves containing chlorophyll.
Mass digging of root crops is carried out from the second half of September. The beets delivered by vehicles are stored in heaps (piles) before processing. To prevent putrefactive processes, beets in heaps are sprayed with milk of lime, and in hot weather they are irrigated with water.
Root crops in heaps continue to live, consuming oxygen from the air and releasing carbon dioxide, as well as water vapor.

Cane sugar-raw, produced in India, Brazil and Cuba, is a product of the processing of juice pressed from sugar cane stalks. The content of sucrose in the juice is 97...98%, and in the stems of the cane - 12...15%, the yield is 40...60 t/ha.
Pressed cane juice is subjected to chemical purification with a small amount of lime, phosphoric acid and sulfur dioxide. In a filtered form, it enters the evaporator plant. After thickening, the syrup from the residue is boiled down until sugar crystals are isolated, which are separated in centrifuges in the form of raw sugar.

Factories that produce sugar, are large, equipped with high-performance production technology. The capacity of individual sugar beet processing plants reaches 6...9 thousand tons per day, and on average - 2.5 thousand tons per day. Sugar beet production - mass, in-line. In it, in a single production flow, the main technological processes and intermediate operations for the processing of beets are carried out with the production of one type of mass marketable product - white granulated sugar. By-products of marketable products are pulp and molasses.
To protect sucrose from decomposition, all technological processes are carried out at a temperature not exceeding 90 ... 100 ° C (only in the first evaporation chambers up to 120 ... 125 ° C), and in an alkaline environment (with the exception of the slightly acidic reaction of diffuse juice).
The duration of the production cycle from the receipt of beets to the receipt of raw white sugar is no more than 12 ... 16 hours, and taking into account the processing of all molasses and yellow sugars in the grocery department - 36 ... 42 hours.

The most important stages of sugar production technology from beets are the following::
. acceptance, storage and supply of beets to the plant;
. cleaning the roots of beets from the ground and impurities;
. grinding (cutting) beets into shavings and extracting juice from it in a diffuse way; juice purification; evaporating water from the juice to obtain a syrup; boiling syrup into a crystalline mass - massecuite I and subsequent
. separation of this mass by centrifugation into white crystalline sugar and molasses; boiling molasses into massecuite II, its additional crystallization and centrifugation to obtain yellow sugar and final molasses-molasses - production waste when working according to the scheme with two massecuite.

In the case of working according to the scheme with three massecuite massecuites, the molasses from massecuite II is not the final one. It is once again boiled down to massecuite III, from which, after crystallization and centrifugation, one more yellow sugar is obtained and already as a waste product - molasses.
Purification (affination) of the last yellow sugar, dissolution of yellow sugars in juice (clearing) with the return of the solution obtained in this case - clerks for cleaning the syrup.
In addition to these technological operations, auxiliary processes are carried out: obtaining lime and saturation (carbon dioxide) gas necessary for purification of juice by burning sulfur of sulfite (sulphurous) gas to purify juice and syrup.
At some plants, additional technological operations are carried out, which are, as it were, a continuation of the main production processes - drying beet pulp and producing animal feed based on it (enriching pulp with additives), obtaining citric acid from molasses microbiologically.
All technological operations are carried out in three main departments of the plant: beet processing, including the supply of beets to the plant; juice cleaning, including evaporation and production of lime, saturation and sulfate gases; product - cooking and crystallization and whitewash.

Extraction of sugar from sugar beet chips
The extraction of sugar from sugar beet chips is carried out by leaching with warm water and diffusion juice and is based on the phenomena of diffusion and osmosis through the permeable walls of sugar beet cells.
Leaching occurs in diffusion batteries, consisting of 12 - 16 diffusers. Diffusers, which are metal cylinders with a capacity of 5-10 m3, are equipped with devices for loading chips and unloading pulp. The contents of the diffusers are heated by steam circulating through the pipes inside the diffuser. The temperature in the diffuser reaches 60 °C or more. At this temperature, the protoplasm of cells coagulates, which facilitates the leaching of sugar from them.
The leaching of sugar in the diffusion battery is carried out gradually. Diffusion juice, moving from one diffuser to another, is gradually saturated with sugar until the sugar content in the juice approaches the sugar content of beets as much as possible.
The first diffuser of the battery is loaded with chips and filled with warm water, which fills the entire space between the chips in the diffuser.
If the sugar content of freshly loaded beet chips is 18% (it can be a little more or less), then after leaching some of the sugar with water and achieving diffusion equilibrium, the sugar in the chips and water is distributed equally and the sugar content of the chips and the resulting juice becomes the same: it is 9% ( 18:2).
The juice obtained in the first diffuser is transferred to the second, loaded with fresh shavings. Upon reaching diffusion equilibrium, the sugar in the chips and juice in the second diffuser is distributed equally, and the sugar content of the juice is 13.5% ((18+9)/2).
From the second diffuser, the juice is transferred to the third, also filled with fresh shavings. The sugar content of the juice in it reaches 15.75% ((18 + 13.5) / 2), etc. In the last diffuser, the sugar content of the juice differs little from the sugar content of fresh beet chips.
Since 9% of sugar remains in the chips in the first diffuser (only 9 of the 18% contained in fresh chips goes into the juice), to extract the sugar, it is refilled with clean water.
By establishing diffusion equilibrium in the first diffuser, juice is again obtained, although with a lower sugar content: (9: 2 = 4.5%). This juice is then transferred to a second diffuser where the sugar content of the chips is 13.5%. Diffusion juice is obtained here with a sugar content of 9% ((13, 5 + 4.5) / 2). Transferring this juice to the third diffuser, where the sugar content of the chips is 15.75%, juice is obtained with a sugar content of 12.37%, etc.
Thus, when the operation of the diffusion battery is set, the most concentrated juice is served on fresh beet chips, and either low concentration juice or pure water is served on more or less sugar-free chips.
In this way, it is possible to extract sugar from beet chips as much as possible and obtain a high-concentration diffusion juice. The loss of sugar in the pulp in this case is only 0.2 - 0.25%.
The movement of juice from one diffuser to another is carried out due to the slight pressure created when pumping water into the first diffuser.
Recently, continuous diffusion apparatuses have been used in sugar refineries, replacing diffusion batteries that are loaded and unloaded periodically.
On the one hand, beet chips are continuously fed into the operating diffusion apparatus, which moves towards the water coming from the opposite side. Water continuously washing the chips leaches sugar from it and gradually turns into a sugar-enriched diffusion juice, which is removed from the diffusion apparatus. Desugared shavings - pulp - are also continuously removed from the apparatus.

Diffusion Juice Purification
In addition to sugar, diffusion juice contains (about 2%) other substances called non-sugars (salts of phosphoric and other acids, proteins), as well as small suspended particles that give the juice a dark color.
Purification of diffusion juice from suspended particles and a significant part of non-sugars is carried out with the help of lime, and carbon dioxide is used for the subsequent removal of lime from the juice. Lime and carbon dioxide are obtained at sugar refineries by roasting limestone (CaCO3=CaO+CO2); its consumption is 5-6% of the weight of the processed beets.
Processing of diffusion juice with lime (in the form of milk of lime) is carried out in cylindrical boilers with agitators - defecators. Under the action of lime, non-sugars coagulate and precipitate or decompose, forming calcium salts that remain in solution.
The lime-treated (defecated) juice enters the saturator, where it is treated with carbon dioxide. Under the action of carbon dioxide, lime turns into calcium carbonate CaCO3, which, precipitating, carries with it non-sugar.
Processed with carbon dioxide (saturated) juice is filtered on mechanical filters. At the same time, filter-press mud containing calcium carbonate, non-sugar and a small amount of sugar (up to 1% of the weight of the mud) is separated from the juice.
The purified diffusion juice retains a dark color, which is eliminated during the subsequent processing of the juice with sulfur dioxide (it is obtained by burning sulfur). The process of treating juice with sulfur dioxide is called sulfitation.

Evaporation of juice, boiling syrup and obtaining sugar
The purified juice enters the evaporator, where most of the water is removed from it. The juice acquires the concentration of syrup (65% solids, including 60% sugar and 5% non-sugars remaining in the diffusion juice after its purification).
The resulting syrup is again bleached with sulfur dioxide and filtered, after which it is boiled down in vacuum apparatus. Boiling the syrup continues for 2.5 - 3 hours at a temperature of about 75 ° C (under vacuum). In the process of boiling, crystallization of sugar occurs. In this case, a product is obtained containing 55 - 60% of sugar crystals and is called the massecuite of the first crystallization. The concentration of solids in the massecuite reaches 92.5% (of which approximately 85% is sugar).
From the vacuum apparatus, the massecuite is lowered into the mixer, and then sent to centrifuges, where the mother liquor is separated from the sugar crystals. The separated mother liquor is called green molasses. It also contains a significant amount of sugar, as well as non-sugar.
After removing the green molasses, the sugar remaining in the centrifuge is washed with water and steamed. As a result, the sugar turns white. When washing sugar crystals in a centrifuge, a liquid containing dissolved sugar is formed - molasses. It is returned to the vacuum apparatus for additional boiling into the massecuite of the first crystallization, which gives white sugar.
Sugar from the centrifuges is sent to the drying drum. Dried sugar is already quite ready Sugar from the centrifuges is sent to the drying drum. Dried sugar is already a completely finished product - granulated sugar containing up to 99.75% pure sugar, counting on dry matter.
Green molasses is also sent to vacuum apparatus for boiling on the massecuite of the second crystallization. At the same time, yellow sugar is obtained, which goes mainly to the confectionery industry. With special processing, yellow sugar can also be turned into ordinary white sugar.
After the isolation of the second crystallization of yellow sugar from the massecuite, fodder molasses, or molasses, is obtained, which is a waste product. The yield of fodder molasses is about 5% of the weight of the processed beets.
Taking into account the losses of sugar in the production process (most of all it is lost in fodder molasses - 9 - 14% of sugar contained in beets), its yield from beets is practically 12 - 13%. At the same time, the consumption of beets per 1 ton of sugar exceeds 7-8 tons.
The process of sugar refining uses a lot of steam and hot water, usually obtained in a factory boiler plant. The total consumption of standard fuel at beet sugar plants (including the cost of burning limestone) is 11 - 12% of the weight of the processed beets.
Beet sugar production is characterized by high water consumption for technological processes. It is 20 times the weight of processed beets. Taking into account the use of recycled water, the consumption of fresh water is also very significant and reaches 8 tons per 1 ton of beets.

Waste management
The most valuable waste product of sugar beet production is molasses, almost half of which consists of sugar and also contains other nutrients. As a result, molasses is used as a concentrated feed for livestock (by direct feeding or as part of compound feed). In addition, feed molasses is processed into alcohol, yeast, citric and lactic acid and other products.
By special processing of fodder molasses, it is possible to extract the sugar contained in it and thereby increase its overall yield from beets and reduce its cost. For this purpose, workshops have been built at some sugar factories, in which fodder molasses is desugared.
Another waste is pulp - sugarless beet chips. The pulp unloaded from the diffusers is transported with water to storage facilities (pulp pits). The beet pulp is nutritious, and animals willingly eat it, it is used in animal husbandry for fattening livestock. Some sugar factories also have their own livestock feed stations.
Fresh pulp contains up to 94% water. To increase the transportability, as well as the nutritional value of the pulp, it is partially dehydrated and thereby the dry matter content in it is increased to 15 - 18%. For long-term storage, the pulp is dried to a moisture content of 10 - 12%, using flue gases for drying.

Seasonality of sugar beet factories
Sugar beet factories are distinguished by a pronounced seasonality of work. Sugar beet ripens, as a rule, in the second decade of September. At this time, they begin digging and transporting it to factories and processing. The factories create a stock of beets, stacked in heaps, which are processed after its digging and hauling. With prolonged storage of beets, its sugar content is significantly reduced. Therefore, the factories tend to process the annual supply of raw materials in the shortest possible time - 3-4 months. Extending the shelf life of beets reduces the yield of sugar per unit of raw material and reduces the profitability of the beet sugar plant.

Refined sugar production
About 20 ... 25% of the produced granulated sugar is subjected to refining in order to obtain a purer food product in solid (lump refined) or friable crystalline (refined granulated sugar) form.
For industrial processing (for refining), granulated sugar with a moisture content of not more than 0.15%, a sugar content of at least 99.75% and a color of up to 1.8 Stammer units is allowed.
The essence of the sugar refining process is that granulated sugar is dissolved, the resulting syrup is purified and boiled into a crystal.
After casting the refined massecuite into molds and cooling it, sugar of high hardness is obtained - poured sugar. Large pieces of poured sugar are broken into smaller ones or cut into pieces of regular shape.

Another method for the production of lump sugar is also used - pressing moistened granulated sugar obtained from refined massecuite in molds. This is how pressed sugar is obtained, which has a lower hardness than cast sugar.
Liquid refined sugar is used in the baking industry and ice cream production.
The color of refined sugar should be pure white, without spots, a bluish tint is allowed, obtained by adding ultramarine.
The yield of finished refined sugar is about 98.5% by weight of the granulated sugar taken into production. Sugar refineries in Odessa, Sumy and Cherkassy operate all year round.

In Ukraine, the main sugar production is concentrated in Vinnitsa, Khmelnitsky, Kyiv, Cherkasy regions. Each of them has 30-40 sugar factories, most of them produce sugar seasonally. The yield of white sugar in relation to the mass of sugar contained in the beets is called the mill factor. In the sugar industry, it is 78-80%.
On average in the industry, the annual yield of sugar is 12 ... 13% by weight of beets, therefore, 7 ... 8 parts of beets are consumed per 1 part of the produced sugar.
The labor input for sugar beet processing is 15…16 man-days per 100 tons of beets.
The total consumption of normal steam (with an average heat content of 2700 kJ / kg) in the plant is 50 ... 60% by weight of beets.
The total turnover of water is 1800…2000% by weight of processed beets, it can be reduced to 150…300%.

Summary of sugar production lines

Resource type	Unitmeasurements	For raw materials 20 tons	For raw materials 50 tons	For raw materials 100 tons	For raw materials 200 tons	Notes
Real Productivity						Depends on the season and the initial sugar content of the beets
The need for a couple
Steam temperature
Water consumption per day tubers washing						can be recycled
Water consumption per day production						Depends on the degree of contamination of tubers
Lime milk consumption per day
Lime milk supply temperature
Milk of lime concentration