From collection point to malthouse Bühler has decisively enhanced its capabilities in the fields of grain handling, cleaning, drying, and storage through the acquisition of the German plant supplier Schmidt-Seeger and integrated them in its new Grain Logistics business unit. Bühler is now in a position to provide products and complete solutions ranging from grain collection points to food production plants. “We have concerned ourselves in depth with the expected development of the global grain markets up to the year 2050,” explains Marcel Scherrer, head of the new Grain Logistics business unit. “A look at the population growth forecast shows that in 40 years, some 9 billion people will have to be fed. The additional requirements must be covered by higher yields through improved growing methods, prevention of post-harvest losses – which today amount to as much as 20 percent – and the development of new growing regions. Grains are delivered to the collection points just…

An extensive retrofit program instead of a new system proved to be the ideal solution for completely The Jordan Silos & Supply General Company (JSSGC) operates a total of four large bulk storage facilities in Jordan, with a total holding capacity of approximately 450,000 metric tons. One of the four facilities of JSSGC is located in the port of Aqaba on the Red Sea. Aqaba is the only sea port of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Retrofit or new system? The silo facility of the Jordan Silos & Supply General Company in Aqaba has a storage capacity of 150,000 metric tons. The cargo vessels supplying the grain are unloaded by three Bühler ship unloaders. Two of these units date back to the year 1978. For the JSSGC management, the question was to whether this aging unloader was to be replaced by a new one or renewed in order to assure the required long-term unloading capacity in the port of Aqaba. In November 2009, JSSGC, therefore entrusted one of their unloaders to Bühler. The substructure of the unloader was still in sound condition even after 30 years of service.…

Minmetal / North Star Shipping - A cargo handling terminal on the Black Sea. All over the world grain is counted as one of our most valuable staple foodstuffs. To meet the growth in demand for modern logistics systems, Bühler and Schmidt-Seeger will in future be working together, having now created Bühler’s new Grain Logistics Business Unit together. One of the latest projects is the new cargo handling terminal for North Star Shipping at the port of Constanta on the Black Sea. The plant is primarily a place of transshipment and an intermediate storage facility. The grain is collected throughout Romania along the Danube route and then loaded onto deep-sea vessels at the port of Constanta. A total of 240,000 tons can be stored in the 32 round steel silos at the cargo handling terminal. Incoming deliveries can be brought by truck, rail and river craft. Schmidt-Seeger supplied four receiving facilities with a capacity of 400t/h. Further there are also two ship receiving areas, each of which has a capacity of 400 t/h. After the product has…

Minmetal / North Star Shipping - A cargo handling terminal on the Black Sea. One of the latest projects is the new cargo handling terminal for North Star Shipping at the port of Constanta on the Black Sea. The plant is primarily a place of transshipment and an intermediate storage facility. The grain is collected throughout Romania at grain collection facilities along the Danube route and then loaded onto deep-sea vessels (Panamax ships) from river craft, trains and trucks at the port of Constanta. A total of 240,000 tons can be stored in the 32 round steel silos at the cargo handling terminal. For better hygiene and improved quality, all the elevators have residue-free conveying systems. In this special design “made by Schmidt-Seeger”, the construction was modified to minimize gaps and eliminate all dead angles and spaces. The result is 99.9% residue-free conveying of the product. This has the major benefit that no residue is left in the conveyor, which in turn means a higher standard of hygiene. As for the trough chain conveyors, the customer…

WinCos.Traceability The traceability of products today is a requirement in all areas of the food industry. Plant operators can safeguard themselves against financial damage by installing a traceability system, which reflects the process as closely as possible and is complete from end to end. Such a system must on the one hand comply with the applicable legal standards and regulations, and on the other hand offer food producers the ability of proving to their customers – on the basis of tamper-proof documentation – the origin and the production process applied. The “WinCos.Traceability” tool integrated in the proven Buhler WinCos process control system ensures complete product traceability, measures production weights, analyzes incorporated process lines, and graphically displays the product flow from the raw material going into the process to the end product coming out of it. “The ‘WinCos.Traceability’ module records the entire production process from beginning to end and…

Twin-level flat store The twin-level flat storage facility built for Ultra-Brag AG in the Auhafen port of Muttenz has a footprint of 42 by 120 meters holds a total of 27,000 cubic meters of bulk animal feeds and of 6,600 cubic meters of fertilizer. The modified design supplied by Buhler – with chain conveyors installed above the flat store roof for introducing the material into the feed storage section instead of belt conveyors inside the building – increased the customer’s total storage capacity by more than 60 percent with given building dimensions. The formulated feeds and the fertilizers are stored and handled on two completely separated building levels. The top level of the flat store is reserved for animal feeds. Its 25 compartments are filled by separate roof-top conveying systems. Fertilizer is stored on the ground floor. As the new flat store is not located on the waterside, a high-capacity, dust-free conveying system had to be constructed from the grab crane to the new shed…

Grain Silo The new bulk storage terminal that Ultra-Brag AG operates in the Rhine port of Kleinhüningen is an impressive structure, with overall height of 83 meters, it clearly dominates the Basel port skyline. This height required a number of special measures: The structure has to be earthquake-proof, it must be resilient enough to absorb wind loads, and its immense weight must be reliably supported by its relatively small footprint of 27 by 40 meters. The concrete structure, which was built by the slip-forming method in three stages, therefore stands on a large number of piles with a thickness of up to 1.2 meters and a length of 28 meters. The bulk storage section houses 32 round storage bins plus 15 interstice bins, which hold more than 40,000 cubic meters of material. Most of the Buhler supplied equipment is installed in the headhouse of the elevator building. The core systems of the entire installation are the two 87-meter-tall belt-and-bucket elevator legs which elevate…