Robson is providing over USD3M of conveying equipment for a new sugar refinery in one of the Middle East development hotspots. Operated by Tate and Lyle and the United Sugar Company of Egypt, part of the Saudi Arabian Savola Group, the refinery is at the Sokhna Port and Logistics Centre on the Red Sea - part of a programme to raise the Egyptian economic profile in the Middle East that has already attracted USD2.3bn of foreign investment.

To date, Robson has won four separate orders for its handling systems: to bring imported raw sugar from the dockside into storage ready for processing; to withdraw it for refining; to transfer it during drying; and to deliver the finished product into storage.

The troughed belt conveyors that make up the systems cover a distance of almost a kilometre and can handle hourly throughputs of up to 1,000 tonnes.

They are being designed and partially built in the UK along with other critical components. Ancillary items such as structural steelwork are being manufactured and installed by Egyptian companies under Robson supervision.

Sokhna is the fourth Robson project for Savola. It has previously worked at the Group's refinery in Jeddah, The first Saudi Arabian home-based sugar processing plant and one of the world's biggest.

Other recent or on-going Robson sugar handling assignments overseas are in Poland, Turkey and Singapore.

All conveyors are of the troughed belt type. Widths are 1400mm from dockside to raw sugar storage and 900mm from storage to the refinery.

Screw conveyors transfer raw and refined sugar in the refinery, and a final enclosed gantry conveyor moves the sugar to the storage silo.

1) Dockside to storage:

• The initial 400m-long section of conveyors, which has a capacity of 1,000tph, brings the raw sugar from the dockside and raises it to the top of an enclosed transfer tower 25m above ground level, where it passes under gravity through two duplex weighers.

• Each weigher has a buffer to accommodate incoming material under continuous feed conditions
• At the foot of the tower the flow of weighed material is turned through 90 degrees and lifted on an 80m-long inclined conveyor to a second, 32m-high transfer tower
• From here it is delivered through another right-angle turn onto a horizontal travelling tripper conveyor in the apex of the roof of the bulk sugar store 31 metres above floor level.

• The tripper runs a distance of 90 metres and has continuous delivery to ensure that the raw sugar can be distributed evenly throughout the store.
• The building has a floor area of 9,240 sq m and a capacity of 120,000 tonnes
• The initial 400m-long section of conveyors, which has a capacity of 1,000tph, brings the raw sugar from the dockside and raises it to the top of an enclosed transfer tower 25m above ground level, where it passes under gravity through two duplex weighers.

2) Storage to refinery:

• Raw sugar is drawn from storage by front loaders and deposited through reception hoppers onto horizontal reclaim conveyors along the side of the store adjacent to the refinery building.
• The sugar is then raised by a 100m-long inclined conveyor to the surge hopper at the head of the refinery.

3) Refinery:

• Screw conveyors transfer the raw sugar from the surge hopper into the refining process.
• When refined, the wet sugar is collected from the centrifugal machines in 800mm diameter ribbon screws with hanging bearer-free single spans up to 13 metres long.
• Further screws transfer the sugar between process equipment until the sugar is conditioned and dry.
• Sugar capacities in the screw conveyors are generally up to a maximum of 200tph.

4) Refinery to storage:

• The finished product leaving the refinery is transported at up to 130tph by a 100m-long inclined conveyor, which rises 30 metres to the delivery point at the head of the storage silo in the nearby granulated sugar store.
• To protect the product from the risk of contamination, the conveyor is housed in a 3.5m diameter tubular gantry with integral flooring for easy personnel access.