Process Design and Simulation of a Single Super Phosphate Plant

Abstract

Fertilizers are very important for the better growth of crops. Pakistan is an agricultural country, so better and cheap fertilizers are important for the country. Single superphosphate is a chemical fertilizer, which contains phosphorous as a major nutrient. It is suited to Pakistan’s soils since they are relatively alkaline. It also contains some micronutrients like calcium, magnesium, aluminum, iron, sulphur and gypsum. Gypsum works as a soil conditioner. Single super phosphate is manufactured by the reaction of finely grounded Rock Phosphate with diluted sulphuric acid. The SSP is available in powder and granulated form. Tri calcium phosphate Ca3(PO4)2 which is the major component of the natural phosphate rock is not soluble in water and plants only use phosphorus components when they are in soluble form. For this, tri-calcium phosphate is converted into mono-calcium phosphate, which is SSP. In this process, sulphuric acid is diluted to 70 percent before mixing it with grinded rock phosphate. The process design and simulation of the single super phosphate plant in our final year project has been carried out to encompass an efficient material balance, energy balance, plant design, and economic analysis, and hazard & operability study, production of 500 tonnes per day of fertilizer. Following that, simulating and costing through Aspen Plus has been carried out to compare costing and overall feasibility of plant. The economic analysis of the plant calculated annual sales and overall installment costs to give us a payback period of approximately 2 years and 3 month