IC201 INDUSTRIAL CHEMISTRY LABORATORY REPORT

EXPERIMENT: PRODUCTION OF SUGAR FROM SUGARCANE

RUTHIRAAN MANI MARAN (1000924636)

DATE OF EXPERIMENT: DATE OF SUBMISSION:

TH

SEPTEMBER 2010

TH

OCTOBER 2010

SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING FACULTY OF ENGINEERING, ARCHIETECTURE & BUILT ENVIRONMENT

TABLE OF CONTENT

Text Content

Page

1. Objective

2. Introduction

3-4

3. Material and Methodology

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4. Discussion

5. Conclusion

6. Limitation of the Experiment

7. Safety Consideration

8. Reference

OBJECTIVE The objective of the experiment is to prepare a sugar from a syrup solution. INTRODUCTION Sugarcane processing is focussed on the production of cane sugar (sucrose) from sugarcane. In order to produce sugar from sugarcane, there are several process are required. HARVESTING There are two type of method to harvest sugarcane which is mechanical harvesters and hand cutting. Hand cutting is the most common harvesting method used throughout the world which cause less damage compare to mechanical harvesters. After cutting the cane, it will be loaded by hand, mechanical grab loaders, or continuous loaders. Cane is transported to the mills using trailers, trucks, railcars, or barges, depending upon the relative location of the cane fields and the processing plants. When the cane is cut, rapid deterioration of the cane begins. Therefore, sugarcane cannot be stored for later processing without excessive deterioration of the sucrose content. After the cane been received at the mill, it will go through extraction of juice process. EXTRACTION At the mill, the cane is mechanically unloaded, placed in a large pile, and, prior to milling, the cane is cleaned. The milling process occurs in two steps which is breaking the hard structure of the cane and grinding the cane. Breaking the cane uses revolving knives, shredders, crushers, or a combination of these processes. For the grinding, or milling, of the crushed cane, multiple sets of three-roller mills are most commonly used although some mills consist of four, five, or six rollers in multiple sets. Conveyors transport the crushed cane from one mill to the next. Imbibition is the process in which water or juice is applied to the crushed cane to enhance the extraction of the juice at the next mill. In imbibitions, water or juice from other processing areas is introduced into the last mill and transferred from mill to mill towards the first two mills while the crushed cane travels from the first to the last mill. The crushed cane exiting the last mill is called bagasse. The juice from the mills is strained to remove large particles and then clarified. In raw sugar production, clarification is done almost exclusively with heat and lime and small quantities of soluble phosphate also may be added. The lime is added to neutralize the organic acids, and the temperature of the juice raised to about 95EC (200EF). A heavy precipitate forms which is separated from the juice in the
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clarifier. The insoluble particulate mass, called mud, is separated from the limed juice by gravity or centrifuge. Clarified juice goes to the evaporators without additional treatment. The mud is filtered and the filter cake is washed with water. EVAPORATION Evaporation is performed in two stages which is first is, initially in an evaporator station to concentrate the juice and second is in vacuum pans to crystallize the sugar. The clarified juice is passed through heat exchangers to preheat the juice and then to the evaporator stations. Evaporator stations consist of a series of evaporators, typically a series of five evaporators. Steam from large boilers is used to heat the first evaporator, and the steam from the water evaporated in the first evaporator is used to heat the second evaporator. This heat transfer process continues through the five evaporators and as the temperature decreases (due to heat loss) from evaporator to evaporator, the pressure inside each evaporator also decreases which allows the juice to boil at the lower temperatures in the subsequent evaporator. Some steam is released from the first three evaporators, and this steam is used in various process heaters in the plant. The evaporator station in cane sugar manufacture typically produces syrup with about 65 percent solids and 35 percent water. Following evaporation, the syrup is clarified by adding lime, phosphoric acid, and a polymer flocculent, aerated, and filtered in the clarifier. From the clarifier, the syrup goes to the vacuum pans for crystallization. BOILING Crystallization of the sugar starts in the vacuum pans, whose function is to produce sugar crystals from the syrup. In the pan boiling process, the syrup is evaporated until it reaches the super saturation stage. At this point, the crystallization process is initiated by seeding or shocking the solution. When the volume of the mixture of liquor and crystals, known as massecuite, reaches the capacity of the pan, the evaporation is allowed to proceed until the final massecuite is formed. At this point, the contents of the vacuum pans (called strike) are discharged to the crystallizer, whose function is to maximize the sugar crystal removal from the massecuite.

MATERIAL Sugar syrup, beaker, hot plate, glass rod, suction filtration apparatus, Buchner funnel, filtration paper, centrifuge and charcoal.
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METHODOLOGY 1. 2. The syrup around 150g was poured off into the beaker. The beaker was heated on the hot plate heater at a temperature on 85 0C until the

water evaporated. 3. 4. The dirty foam that occurred on the top of the syrup was got rid of. The boiling was continued until the crystal occurred so the resultant raw sugar was

brown in color. 5. 6. 7. The charcoal was added to the brown crystal to make it white. The sugar was dried in a dryer that uses hot air. The net weight of sugar was measured.

RESULTS Weight of syrup = 150g. Weight of the evaporated water = 138.1g. Weight of net sugar = 11.9g.

DISCUSSION All the procedure of the experiment was followed correctly until sugar was extracted from sugar syrup. Suction filtration apparatus and centrifuge was used to remove dirt of sugarcane water and it was boiled until it reached crystallization stage. After boiling process, sugarcane was filtered by using charcoal which is used to remove water and some volatile substances. There are small amount of sugar was extracted due to some limitation in the experiment which being mention in limitation section. CONCLUSION Throughout the experiment, we can deduce that small amount of sugar was extracted from sugar syrup water due the some limitation in the experiment.
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LIMITATION 1. Heating of the sugar syrup must be done using constant heat to obtain better sugar.
2. The sugar syrup was boiled in order to become crystallization but during the process,

sugar might evaporate in boiling process. This could affect the quantity of the final sugar product.

SAFETY CONSIDERATION 1. All the instructions and modification of the experiment performed by student must be authorised and supervised by the lab tutor. 2. Safety equipment such as goggles (eye), gloves (skin) and lab coat was used during the experiment when dealing with highly concentration and/or toxic substance in order to avoid any contact with skin or eyes. 3. All the equipment which was used must be washed cleanly by using distilled water before and after using it in the experiment.

REFERENCE 1. http://www.sucrose.com/lcane.html 2. http://en.howtopedia.org/wiki/How_to_Make_Sugar_from_Sugar_Cane 3. Sugarcane, by Glyn James (2004)