Watawala Plantations disengages from national grid for palm oil production

Monday, 30 December 2013 01:09 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Sustainable approach to edible oil production via introduction of in-house steam turbine with an investment of Rs. 30 m

In a bid to take the sustainability route in palm oil production, Sunshine Group’s Watawala Plantations has introduced a steam turbine to their production facility, which will take the burden off the national grid.

According to Watawala Plantations PLC Palm Oil Mill General Manager Milton Wijepala, prior to commissioning the turbine last month the company was totally dependent on the CEB to run the mill. This resulted in an expenditure of Rs. 1.5 million per month on electricity consumption. With the latest move, the company is looking at contributing to overall national productivity through the use of renewable energy. “Our intention is to cover the entire milling process using turbine power. It’s a national productivity aspect that we are looking at. On one side we are reducing our carbon footprint by using a completely natural process and on the other we will cut down our production costs whilst at the same time make our milling operation more efficient in terms of productivity,” the General Manager emphasises. Elaborating on the milling process, using the turbine which is installed at a cost of Rs. 30 million, Wijepala says it is a simple progression, where the turbine is run on the waste of the palm oil fruit i.e. fibre. Although the fibre can also be used as fertiliser, with the installation of the turbine we are using a higher quantity to power the turbine, which makes it completely sustainable,” he says. Being the single largest plantation company to manage oil palm estates in Sri Lanka, they cater to the local demand, meeting about 7% of the total edible oil requirement. The company expects to recover the cost of the turbine in less than two years. Reductions in imports will have major impact on economy “Earlier, all edible oil was imported as we were operating on a very small scale. I don’t think we had even 1000 hectares of oil palm in

Sri Lanka, 10-15 years ago. But it has now gone up to 7000 hectares. By having our own oil palm plantations locally, we are stopping a lot of foreign exchange from going out of the country. Reductions in imports will have a major impact on the economy in terms of growth,” says Wijepala. Explaining that the company is on a productivity drive with a vision to reach a productivity enhancement level of up to 20 tonnes of FFB per hectare from its current level of 15 tonnes, by 2015, the General Manager says increase in productivity will also demand more grid power resulting in cost escalation. “Currently, Watawala Plantations has 3000 hectares under OP of which 2000 hectares is in bearing while the balance 1000 hectares is still in the immature stage. With an increase in land productivity, production is expected to go up by 4 million kg of FFB. However with the newly acquired turbine, the company is hopeful that they could bring down the cost of production substantially,” he adds. The company’s overall strategy is to even out the escalating cost of production mainly due to rising labour costs by setting it off against the reduced energy costs. The whole concept of running a sustainable business in agriculture is to avoid spikes in production costs. Edible oil has a high cost in terms of its import bill and if companies work towards increasing yield by good agronomic practices (addressing stress factors such as physical, nutrition, moisture) and keep production costs from escalating, then Sri Lanka will be able to gradually slow this high cost import market and save valuable foreign exchange.