A TEC has been awarded two contracts by Messebo Building Materials of Ethiopia: one for an alternative fuels system and the other for a big-bag filling station.

The alternative fuels system contract was awarded to A TEC in the first quarter of the year and includes engineering, supply of equipment, civil construction works and supervision. The alternative fuels are sesame straw/stalk.

Manufacturing and erection will be carried out by Mesfin Industrial Engineering PLC, a high qualified sister company of Messebo.

Utilisation of alternative fuels has become an important factor in the competitiveness of the operation not only in financial terms but also in terms of sustainability of the business. To avoid any adverse effects by co-firing alternative fuels with coal, which is the standard fuel in this case, a plant investigation is carried out prior to installation of the biomass fuel feeding system. This becomes particularly obvious by the different chemical composition of the sesame straw/stalk.

To cover preparation as well as dosing of the renewable feedstock to the plant, the system offered consists of installation in two individual areas. Collection and preparation of straw and production of bales will be realised at Kafta Humera while the 3000tpd cement plant is located in Mekelle.

To allow maximum flexibility, the design will be done in two phases with different plant capacities. The first phase, which will be realized in the current project, will cover a baling capacity of 50tph and an alternative fuel feeding capacity to the calciner of 10tph. Phase two includes the design for a scale up to a baling capacity of 71tph and an alternative fuel feeding capacity of 20tph.

The installation of the alternative fuel system will begin in the fourth quarter of 2013 and start-up is scheduled for the first quarter of next year.

Big-bag filling station

A TEC was also awarded in the 1Q13 the contract to design and implement a cement big-bag filling station including engineering, supply of important equipment, erection and commissioning. Local manufacturing and erection will also be undertaken by Mesfin Industrial Engineering.

The system will consist of three filling stations in modular design. Each station can handle15 bags per hour. Consequently a total number of 45 big-bags per hour with an overall capacity of 90tph can be reached.

The new big-bag filling station will be installed at the Mekelle cement plant to improve flexibility of final product delivery and will be installed and by the end of 2013.