The process of sugar production begins with the preparation of cane for juice extraction. Cane is cleaned by spreading it agitated conveyers and passing through jets of warm water, cleaning off leaves, soil and rock particles. Beetroot is chopped before juice extraction.
The process of juice extraction involves cutting, shredding and pressing of cane and beet with the help of roller mills. Extracted juice is a dark green, murky acidic liquid needing boiling for further processing. Residual bagasse is sent to boilers for use as fuel for power generation.
This cane juice is treated with heat and milk of lime to remove acidity. The treated juice is then further heated and sent to sedimentary cleaning.
The clear juice is evaporated to a syrup stage, bleached by sulphur dioxide then sent to vacuum pans for further concentration and sugar grain formation. Crystals are developed to a desired size and the crystallized mass is then dropped in crystallizers to exhaust the mother liquor of its sugar as much as possible. This is then centrifuged for separating the crystals from molasses. The molasses is re-boiled for further crystallization.
The original syrup is progressively de-sugarized until finally, a viscous liquid is obtained from which sugar can no longer be recovered economically. This liquid, “final molasses,” is sent to the distillery.
The sugar separated from molasses in the centrifuge is dried, bagged and sent to storage houses to be classified according to size of crystals and sent for packing and labeling.