Malting Plant Hodonice

The Hodonice malting plant is situated in the traditional agricultural area in the South Moravian region near Znojmo, close to the Czech-Austrian border. In 2009, an extensive reconstruction of the malting plant was carried out. The reconstruction included construction of a new malt kiln and modernization of the building used for germination of barley. Thanks to the extensive modernization, a production capacity increased by more than twice (from 45,000 tons to 100,000 tons per year). With such production, the Hodonice malting plant belongs among the largest malt producers in the South Moravian region.

Hodonice malting plant - malt kiln

A new Central (SCADA-based) Control System was installed during the extensive reconstruction of the Hodonice malting plant. New Control System provides control of whole malt production process. Reliance 4 was installed to provide reliable monitoring and control of the malt production processes and facilities. The PROTECO s.r.o. company from Pardubice, Czech Republic, is responsible for installing this Reliance 4 based Central Control System in the Hodonice malting plant.

Description of the implementation:

There are two control computers with the Reliance 4 software installed used for controlling and monitoring the malt production process. These two computers are located in the main control room. The first control computer (Control PC 1) communicates directly with all Tecomat TC700 PLC devices, logs data to databases on its harddrive and provides data and alarms/events (real-time and historical) for visualisation running on the second control computer (Control PC 2). The communication between the two control computers is provided over the local network. The Tecomat PLC devices are used for controlling of the belt conveyors, steeping process, germination process, kiln process and process of separating rootlets.

The second control computer (Control PC 2) logs data to databases on network storage and provides data for other computers that are used to monitor or control the particular processes over the local network. On top of that, visualization can be displayed on an LCD screen of the CEO, main technologist and service engineer.

Examples of visualization windows:

Visualization of the kiln process

Visualization of the technology used for steeping of barley grain

Visualization of the technology used for separating rootlets

Parameter set up of the germination process