ARRANGEMENT OF STEAM COILS IN A VACUUM PAN

There are many interesting and intricate problems in connection with the extraction of the sugar from the wash waters, sweet waters and low-grade syrups that are constantly accumulating in a sugar refinery, but space will not admit of their being dealt with here. Suffice it to say that the process of extraction is carried to a point where the sugar recovered barely pays for the labor and fuel expended in the operation. The ultimate result is white sugar, table syrup and molasses.

This molasses is used largely in the manufacture of vinegar and alcohol. Mixed with grain and alfalfa meal, it makes an excellent stock food that cattle take to readily and that possesses high value as a fattening agent. The sucrose and glucose content of molasses as it leaves the refinery is about fifty per cent.

Naturally, in a process involving so much handling, filtering and boiling, there must be some loss, and the efficiency of a refinery is based upon the percentage of granulated sugar recovered from the raw article delivered to the melt. It may be stated for general guidance that, taking an average of the refineries of the United States, one hundred pounds of refined white sugar is made from each one hundred and seven pounds of ninety-six-degree raw sugar melted. Some of the sugar lost is accounted for in the molasses, in the sediment from the filter presses, and in the wash waters from the char filters. The remainder is the undetermined loss in handling, in sugar destroyed by heating, and in sugar dust escaping during the manufacturing operation. As has been said, the component parts of raw sugars vary more or less, and the recovery in white sugar from two lots of raws, each polarizing ninety-six degrees, might differ considerably according to the refractory matter in the original raw sugar.

The following figures give a fairly accurate idea of the disposition of one hundred pounds of ninety-six-degree raw sugar in refining:

Water, which is eliminated.70per cent
Non-sugar, which is eliminated3.30”
Sucrose loss, undetermined.75”
Sucrose left in molasses1.75”
Sucrose extracted in granulated form93.50”
Raw sugar melted100.00”

The undetermined loss includes every loss from the time the raw sugar is weighed into the warehouse until the granulated article is sold to the buyer. It is evident, therefore, that one of the principal items of refining cost is the actual loss of weight in converting raw into refined sugar. Assuming that the raw sugar costs four cents per pound, the refiner has lost on each one hundred pounds melted, four cents × 6½ pounds, or twenty-six cents, less the small value of the resulting molasses. If the raw sugar cost six cents, the loss would be thirty-nine cents. At four cents, the loss is equivalent to $5.20 per ton, or, in the case of a refinery melting two million pounds of raw sugar daily, $5,200.00 for each working day. This does not include any of the operating expenses, such as labor, fuel, bone-char, containers, selling expense or administration—just the actual value of the raw sugar lost in the process of refining.

REFINERY CENTRIFUGAL MACHINES