Adhunik Group Case Study
New CDE Iron Ore Washing Plant Installed in Orissa, India
A new CDE Iron Ore washing plant has recently
been installed in Orissa, India, on a site belonging
to the Adhunik Group – one of India’s largest steel
producers. The new CDE OreMax system uses
washing technologies common to the quarrying
industry in order to improve the quality of the raw
material used by Adhunik in their steel production
operation.
The Adhunik plant was delivered through CDE’s office
in Kolkata, India, which currently employs 50 people.
CDE have a well established reputation in Europe and
The Middle East in the provision of their processing
systems to the quarrying, recycling and waste
management industries and the development of the
OreMax system is a development of the company’s
existing technology to the specific demands of the
Indian market.
“The sand washing systems offered by CDE in
Europe and The Middle East have a long established
reputation for industry leading performance in
terms of fines recovery and the production of high
quality, high value material” explains Manish Bhartia,
managing director of CDE’s India operation. “The
company has a well established history of adapting
existing technologies to new applications, and the
OreMax system is yet another example of success
in this area.”
Adhunik Metaliks, a unit of the Adhunik Group of
companies that purchased this new CDE washing
system for a site in Orissa, currently source raw iron
ore from a variety of mines in the Barbil region. One
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of the major problems that the industry has faced
in recent times has been the decline in the quality
of the raw iron ore material available to processors
such as Adhunik. With this in mind Adhunik decided
that washing was the only way in which they could
improve the quality of their raw material. The contract
for the full iron ore washing plant was given to CDE
based on a comprehensive testing process which
highlighted the kind of quality improvements that
washing would bring to the raw material.
“We were able to show Adhunik Metaliks that they
would enjoy considerable benefits from the installation
of our OreMax system” says CDE’s Technical Sales
Manager for this project, Ruchin Garg. “Not only
does this system offer significant improvements in
the quality of the material processed but there are
also numerous other advantages – compact design,
very low moisture content of the final product, and
reduction of contaminants.”
Another key issue with this, and indeed any ore
processing plant exists around the variable nature
of the feed material. In this instance, Adhunik are
sourcing material from a variety of mines, and this
is very much the norm. A direct consequence of this
is the variable nature of the feed material. One of
the major advantages of the CDE system lies with
its ability to cope with the varying nature of the feed
while still delivering significant improvements in
product quality by way of considerable increases in
the Fe value.
Another key element of the CDE processing system
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is the focus on water treatment and recycling. Each
plant is designed to ensure maximum recycling
of the water used in the washing process through
the introduction of a number of pieces of specialist
equipment. Once again, it is the highly customised
nature of the CDE system that proves appealing to
customers such as Adhunik.
“We don’t just offer one system and try and get our
customer to fit in with it” explains Manish. “Each
system we build is designed specifically to meet the
customers’ requirements in relation to capacity, feed
material and requirement for water recycling.”
The CDE Process
The washing process starts with iron ore fines of
-10mm being fed into the CDE Feed Hopper, which
contains a belt feeder mechanism for efficient transfer
of the material to an inclined conveyor. From here, the
feed material is delivered to one of CDE’s ProGrade
twin deck rinsing screens.
The specially designed spray bars on the upper
deck of the ProGrade screen allow for the removal
of surface contaminants from the feed material. This
top deck of the screen removes the washed +5mm
material, which is stockpiled. Meanwhile, the -5mm
material is pumped to an EvoWash fines processing
plant.
The EvoWash plant has been installed on numerous
quarrying and recycling installations throughout
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Europe and The Middle East. The plant is
equipped with a heavy duty Warman slurry pump, 2
hydrocyclones and one of CDE’s dewatering screens
After passing through the 2 hydrocyclones, the
material is delivered to the dewatering screen where
the product is dewatered to approximately 12%
moisture content. The dewatered product is then
stockpiled while the waste water from the washing
process is sent to an AquaCycle HighRate Thickener
for the water treatment phase to begin.
As the waste water enters the thickener tank it is
mixed with a small amount of flocculent, which is
prepared in the CDE FlocStation. This process is fully
automatic and is carefully monitored on an ongoing
basis to ensure the effective separation of silts and
clays from the water. The thickened sludge settles
to the bottom of the thickener tank. Here a set of
rakes are in constant motion to stop the sludge from
setting. The rakes are fitted with sensors which send
signals back to the plc control panel concerning the
amount of resistance they are encountering. The
rate at which the rakes move is then automatically
adjusted according to this data. Following this, the
thickened sludge is then pumped to an onsite tailings
pond via a heavy duty Warman sludge pump/
As the waste sludge is pumped away, the clean
recycled water overflows the top of the thickener tank
and is then transferred to the CDE AquaStore water
pumping system. This water is then recycled back to
the washing plant which ensures that the fresh water
required to run the plant is substantially reduced.
This phase of the plant process is critical as there are
quality guidelines relating to the water used to feed
the washing system which necessitate the removal of
the waste solids.
Prior to the new CDE plant being commissioned
Adhunik Metaliks were faced with a number of
problems that required attention. The first of these
was the decline in the quality of the raw iron ore being
processed on site. This problem was accentuated by
the variable nature of the feed material which is a
direct consequence of purchasing the material from
a variety of sources. On top of these two issues,
Adhinik had a limited amount of space available to
them and were also concerned about the potential
environmental impact of a washing operation as a
result of the amount of water required to feed the
system.
The CDE OreMax system has successfully dealt
with all of these problems. Firstly, washing is
widely accepted to be the most efficient method of
increasing the value of whatever material is being
processed and CDE’s experience on plants with
variable feed materials allowed them to construct
a plant which would perform to the required level.
In addition to this the plant is very compact, which
ensures that the amount of space required for the
processing operation is kept to an absolute minimum.
Finally, CDE’s expertise and experience in the
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waste water management phase of quarrying and
mining operations on a global scale ensured that the
environmental impact of the washing operation could
be managed to a level deemed acceptable by the
customer.
This new Iron Ore washing plant in Orissa marks
the beginning of yet another phase in the company’s
development. The new technology being used by
Adhunik is proven to deliver substantially higher value
product than was previously possible. This project is
one of several that CDE are currently working on in
the region and the signs are that this will be another
very successful market for the company.
“We are very pleased with the Adhunik project and
are very confident that there will be many more
installations like this over the coming months and
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years” explains Manish. “The results we have to date
confirm what we have been preaching for some time
now – the improvement in quality of properly washed
ore ensures that return on investment can typically
be achieved well within the first year of operation.”
“We made the decision to purchase the CDE
iron ore washing plant as it was very clear
that they as a company have invested a lot
of time into conducting detailed research of
the market and how the current problems
can be addressed. They were able to show
us that their washing system was the correct
solution. Our experience to date with this
plant proves that the technology they provide
offers significant advantages for those
operating sinter and DRI plants.”
Manoj Agarwal , Managing Director of
Adhunik Metaliks
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