Executive Summary : | Objective: Validation of integrated process of increasing brine evaporation rate (heat absorbing materials (edible dyes/carbon black)+ Solar Concentrators/recirculating fluids + Mechanical turbulence) CSMCRI Experimental Salt Farm at a medium scale (4-5 acre area of salt works); Assessment of salt quality and yield of salt produced; Deployment/demonstration of process in 4-5 selected salt producing units with a production of >50,000 tons of salts – proliferation of technology in large solar salt works; Deployment and demonstrate the process to small scale salt producers in the area of 5-10 acres Summary: World's total salt production is around 330 Million MT, which represents a business valued at about $ 20 billion at current prices. Indian Salt Production of 30 Million MT (~10% of world's production). The main sources of salt in Inida are Sea brine, Lake Brine and Sub-soil brine. Gujarat, Tamil nadu and Rajasthan produce 96% of the countrys production, in which Gujarat is producing 76.7%, Tamil Nadu -11.16% and Rajasthan is producing 9.86%. Annual salt demand in India is rising by 5-6%, driven largely by rise in industrial consumption, particularly for caustic soda and soda ash and exports. Projected demand by 2022: 35-40 Million MT; & there is huge potential for exports (currently the exports are higher than 10 Million MT). India is the third largest producer of salt in tthe world after China and USA with an average annual production of about 260 lakh ton . The current annual requirement of salt in our country is estimated to be 120 lakh ton for industrial use and 63 lakh ton for edible use. Also the future requirement grows day by day considering increasing industrial requirements as well as export potential of Indian salts. Most of the salts in India is manufactured mainly by solar evaporation of seawater, sub-soil brine and lake rine.Sea salt constitutes about 82% of the total salt production in the country. Among various states Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh , Maharasthra, Karnataka, Orissa, West Bengal and Goa the 3 major salt producing states are Gujarat (75.38%) Rajasthan (9.68%) and Tamil Nadu (12.38%), which also cater to the requirement of other States. But the land leased for Salt production remains the same whereas the requirement grows drastically. Since Solar salt production is a seasonal crop which generally produced from month of December to June in India, it solely depends on solar energy for evaporation as we connot utilize any other source of energy for this cheap commodity which will increase the cost of salt. So, our goal was to enhance brine evaporation by using eco-friendly methods within the same land area to increase the solar salt yield. The process of the invention deals with significant improvements in salt yield and quality of salt crystal and increase the productivity in per acers land area in solar salt works. The process can be implemented in any solar salt works and suitable for industrial applications. |