Acceptance and dispatch of a lamella thickener for Uralkali PJSC
At the production site of Passat NPO, the acceptance of a large-scale lamella thickener by representatives of the customer — Uralkali PJSC — was successfully completed. Specialists from the processing plant carried out a detailed inspection of the completeness of the delivery, the quality of manufacture and the full compliance of the equipment with the design documentation prior to dispatch to the site.
In accordance with the contract for the technical modernization of the sylvinite processing plant, Passat manufactured and supplied a high-capacity lamella thickener with a diameter of 15 meters. The equipment is capable of processing up to 1,600 m3/h of hot saturated brine at temperatures of up to 97 °C.
The thickener is designed to operate in a corrosive environment. Its construction utilizes titanium, high-alloy stainless steels of grades 1.4571 and 1.4462, as well as low-alloy steel with a protective vinyl ester coating. The unit is supplied as a complete package: together with process pumps, shut-off and control valves, piping, and a state-of-the-art automation system with proprietary software.
Key benefits of the new technology
The introduction of thin-layer thickening will bring a number of significant benefits to the plant:
- increase the specific load per unit area by a factor of 4.5;
- significantly reduce capital expenditure compared with traditional 25-metre-diameter Dorr-type radial thickeners;
- significantly reduce the footprint, cut the volume of construction and installation work, and reduce the amount of auxiliary equipment;
- optimize operating costs, in particular for depreciation, maintenance and energy consumption.
To transport the equipment, the customer will require around thirty heavy-duty lorries to deliver the large-scale assemblies and components of the lamella thickener. NPO Passat guarantees the full project implementation cycle: from supervision of installation and commissioning to professional training of the customer’s personnel and achieving the planned operational performance targets.
This delivery marks the next stage in the development of modern thin-layer thickening solutions. Such technologies have already proven their high efficiency at enterprises in the mining and chemical industry, delivering a significant increase in productivity whilst substantially reducing both capital and operating costs.