Anonymous Sugar Refinery

A major French sugar refinery processing 20,000 tonnes of beet per day relied on two industrial boilers — capable of producing 140 and 120 tonnes of steam per hour respectively — as the sole power source during its annual campaign season. The facility generated 15MW of electricity entirely on-site, with 85% of steam directed to the turbo-generator and the remainder supporting sugar manufacturing processes. By 2009, the aging distributed control system (DCS) governing these boilers had become obsolete, with no integration into the broader plant control infrastructure. Operating the boilers in isolation meant manual power matching between units, increased reliability risk, and fragmented process visibility — critical vulnerabilities for equipment that the factory cannot operate without.

Tereos selected Rockwell Automation's PlantPAx Process Automation System to replace the legacy DCS, with the migration scoped and executed as a turnkey project by Rockwell Automation Global Solutions. The implementation centered on three redundant Allen-Bradley ControlLogix PACs, providing fault-tolerant control architecture suited to the boilers' criticality. Rockwell's boiler management specialists conducted a retrospective analysis of the legacy system before defining migration logic, including highly complex regulation algorithms, burner fine-tuning, and load-demand anticipation calculations. The new system was fully integrated into the factory's plant-wide control network. A week-long dry run preceded the September campaign start, allowing operators and the Rockwell team to validate loads and finalize adjustments under controlled conditions before live production.

After two complete sugar campaigns, the refinery reported measurable improvements across reliability, efficiency, and integration:

• Boiler output reached 96%, up from prior performance under the legacy DCS
• Zero stoppages recorded throughout the first campaign following migration
• Commissioning completed in under two days once production started
• Boilers linked together with automatic power matching now handled by the PlantPAx system, eliminating manual intervention
• Traceability centralized across the entire production site — alarms, operator actions, and process history unified in a single system

Operators noted improved ergonomics at supervision workstations, and the site became a benchmark reference within the broader Tereos group.

• Redundant control architecture is non-negotiable for critical utilities: Three redundant ControlLogix PACs ensured the boilers — the factory's sole power source — could not become a single point of failure.
• Migration timelines in seasonal industries require compressed execution: The March-to-September window left no margin for delays; a structured turnkey approach with domain-specific expertise (boiler management) was essential.
• Integration unlocks value beyond the target system: Connecting boiler control to the plant-wide network enabled automatic power matching and centralized traceability that the legacy isolated system could never provide.
• Dry runs before live campaigns reduce go-live risk: A week of pre-campaign testing allowed final tuning without production pressure.
• Operator adoption follows ergonomic investment: Redesigning supervision workstations alongside the technical migration accelerated team buy-in.