Rising to the salt extraction problem

A salt extraction operation needed to transfer rapidly from an onshore to an offshore website equipped by 5 km of pipework. The company turned to move control partner Celeros to assist meet the distinctive circumstances encountered at the new salt well.
Overview of the 2 new water injection pumps for single and parallel operation, following installation and commissioning on the Frisia Zout BV website.
A new salt extraction plant off the north coast of Holland has been brought on-line forward of schedule, stopping a possible halt in production when the existing onshore properly developed issues. Frisia Zout BV, part of K+S Minerals and Agriculture GmbH, was capable of overcome the time and technical challenges of accelerating the project by working in partnership with Celeros Flow Technology (Celeros FT).
The bulk of the salt produced by Frisia Zout BV goes loose to a forty,000-tonne storage facility for supply in bulk to business. The remainder is packed in smaller quantities for use in meals manufacturing or made into cubes for water purification.
The salt is extracted underneath licence from the Dutch authorities. The current borehole licence
allowed K+S to extract salt from underground on the mainland. Due to regulatory adjustments, the model new licence would only allow extraction from subsea sources off the coast. Consequently, a new borehole and related plant was required at the Frisia Zout BV web site.
New challenges
K+S began planning for a new pump building in 2017, and development started in April 2020 with the purpose of bringing it onstream earlier than the prevailing extraction licence expired at the end of 2021. However, unexpected difficulties arose with the prevailing onshore nicely, which meant that manufacturing would cease before anticipated. To bridge the hole, Frisia Zout BV started bringing in salt water by tanker, however this was an costly various. As a end result, it became imperative to bring the brand new offshore properly onstream as quickly as possible.
Time pressures weren’t the one challenges the corporate confronted. Due to the pure geology, the extraction path to the model new offshore resource was not a straight bore: it changed course twice before reaching the salt deposits. In reality, the brand new plant is fed by one of many deepest wells in the world and has 5 km of pipework beyond the water injection pumps. As a result, the method water has to be pumped in at high pressure (250 barg) and at a high move price (450 m3/h) to extract the amount of salt required, making the choice of pumps critical to success.
Total solution
Frisia Zout BV has an extended and established relationship with Celeros FT by way of the ClydeUnion Pumps brand, primarily based not only on the high quality of ITS OEM pumps but additionally on its capability to respond shortly to any operational issues. The firm turned to its trusted move management associate once again for assist in assembly the distinctive circumstances encountered on the new salt nicely.
Celeros FT brand ClydeUnion Pumps assessed the move requirements for the water injection course of at the new plant and verified that CUP-BB3 pumps might be made to fulfill necessities. The pumps have been specified with Duplex stainless-steel casings because they might be working in a salt-laden setting. Celeros FT manufactured, equipped, put in and commissioned the mission-critical pumps for injecting water into the new offshore salt cavern, assembly unusual necessities for high pressure and high flow rates. In addition, they supported Frisia Zout BV in bringing an older pump back into service as a spare: assessing it and upgrading the casing to ensure it met the new responsibility requirements.
เกจวัดแรงดันต่ำ , challenge supervisor for Frisia Zout BV, explained: “We have used CUP-BB3 pumps prior to now and located that their multistage centrifugal design gives better efficiency, compared to plunger pumps, for this software. We wished to make use of them once more for the new venture. The Celeros FT staff responded to the challenges magnificently, using their engineering experience to identify the best answer to fulfill the stress and circulate charges we required, delivering the pump skids to meet the brand new construction schedule and helping us hold the project on monitor.”
Future assured
The new salt extraction plant got here on-line in December 2020. Its CUP-BB3 pumps meet the excessive stress and move rates required for the applying and might run in parallel, which has improved productivity. The availability of a spare pump offers further confidence that production downtime will be minimal. The company’s capacity to fulfill the accelerated project deadline is especially impressive when you suppose about that the Covid-19 pandemic was already affecting supplies of supplies and elements. The Celeros FT staff labored exhausting to ensure that this did not have any impression on their customer.
Celeros FT also provided specialist engineering expertise throughout the set up and commissioning phase and will proceed to ensure the pumps operate satisfactorily all through the plant’s 15-year lifespan, although the pump building may be required to serve multiple properly in future as demand for K+S high purity salt continues to develop. Easy alternative of put on and tear elements and ongoing service assist from Celeros FT will ensure that the BB3 pumps proceed to meet operational parameters throughout the extraction plant’s lifetime.
Riemer mentioned: “The mixture of top of the range OEM tools and sensible engineering abilities provided by Celeros Flow Technology was instrumental in delivering this challenge forward of time. I’m convinced it will have taken so much longer to get what we required from one other pump manufacturer. The company’s responsiveness was essential in meeting our revised deadline, reducing prices and preserving extraction at this website viable.” Riemer concluded: “This is the first offshore extraction nicely we’ve developed however it has been a largely optimistic experience thanks to Celeros Flow Technology. They brought invaluable engineering expertise and specialist pump information to this project and are a fundamental part of its success.”
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