Pelletized
TLA
OVERVIEW:
A. Lake
Asphalt of Trinidad and Tobago (1978) Ltd. will in 2005, commission a state of the art, Trinidad Lake Asphalt
Pelletization Plant which will transform the product into small,
‘pea’ shaped pellets. This plant brings to fruition, several years
of sustained research into finding a new and more user friendly form
of product, packaging and delivery of TLA. Apart from its in house
research and development team, the company has established
long-standing relationships with some of the foremost experts in
asphalt technology locally, regionally and internationally.
TLAThe pellets do not
look anything like the sticky black substance that is associated with
the material extracted from the Pitch Lake. The pellets are all of a uniformed size,
approximately 6 - 9 mm in diameter with a rounded appearance and
coated, giving them a generally white appearance.
Pelletization
in the context of LATT represents the marriage of two technologies.
The first is Underwater Pelletization Technology, which involved the
cutting or pelletizing of molten TLA.
Pelletization technology
utilizes the well known extrusion principle, which has already been
used in other industrial
areas.
The
second part of the technology involves the coating of TLA pellets with
a specialty formulated coating and process. The absence of
coating, will cause the pellets to coalesce and it is therefore
crucial to maintaining the shape and form of the TLA pellet.
(undesirable) .The coating is an essential element of the process and
represents 3 - 5 % by weight of the complete pellet.
END
