The students of the S4 Mech(2103-2017) batch went for an Industrial Visit on 31st Jan 2015. The company selected for the industrial visit was Travancore Cochin Chemicals Ltd which is situated at Udyogamandel.
The Travancore Cochin Chemical Ltd known locally as TCC is a limited liability company where the majority of the shares of the company is held by the state government. This company was started as a partnership concern in the name “Travancore Mettur Chemicals” with FACT and MCIC (Mettur Chemicals and Industrial Corporation) as partners. In 1951 the company was registered as a public limited company with the major share held by the Kerala State and the company was renamed at “Travancore Cochin Chemicals Ltd”. Over the years TCC made lot of progress and showed good growth to become the first unit in India to manufacture Rayon grade Caustic soda.
The batch was given a brief description about the company. The company produces variety of products 1. Caustic soda Lye, 2. Caustic soda flakes, 3. Liquid chlorine, 4. Hydro chloric acid and 5. Sodium hypochlorite. The main raw materials of the company is salt, water and mainly electricity. We were shown the salt storage facility. Water is added to Salt to form brine solution. The brine solution contains lot of impurities. There is two stage purification primary and secondary purification. In the primary purification almost 70 to 85% impurities is removed. In the Secondary purification the rest of the impurities are removed. Secondary process involves electrolysis as well as production of Nacl and NaOH. The technology used was mercury cell and now the company uses the latest technology, the membrane cell technology. He also gave us brief detail about how much of chemicals is produced daily.
The students were also taken to the HCl plant. Necessary precautions are taken to maintain safe working environment. Chlorine is stored in -15 degree in carbon steel tanks as chlorine is highly corrosive in elevated temperature. Hydrogen on reacting with air can cause fire or explosions. Students observed the production process, the valves, the pipes and the different pumps used in the process. This industrial visit was indeed useful to understand the various process and to know how a company functions.The students were accompanied by faculty members Mr Mathew Prins Korah and Mr Alex Paul.
