The company’s first boiler sold into Australia, to a meat by-product processing company, was supplied in early October this year. It was transported by road from the John Thompson factory near Cape Town to Port Elizabeth, then shipped on a roll-on roll-off vessel that was taking motor vehicles to Brisbane, Australia. Upon arrival it was unloaded onto the special haulage vehicle, with a 12 axle trailer, shown in the photograph.
Negotiations with the customer and its appointed engineering, procurement and construction contractor began in 2012. Early this year the Australians, after indicating that they were satisfied in principle with what John Thompson could offer, visited the Bellville factory to verify John Thompson's capability to adhere to their stringent quality standards.
Their audit of John Thompson's procedures exceeded their expectations and they promptly ordered two Europac 21 t/h steam capacity coal-fired boilers and one Enviropac 16 t/h biogas-fired boiler. The new coal-fired boilers were purchased to replace aging watertube coal-fired boilers in the customer’s plant. The project also included the installation of digesters on existing ponds to produce biogas. The biogas will in turn be burnt in the biogas-fired boiler to produce steam, thereby reducing fuel costs and the company’s carbon footprint.
John Thompson continues to experience strong demand from the niche tea industry in East Africa for its Simpac wood-fired boilers. It has sold seven of these to customers in Kenya, Tanzania and Malawi since January.
The Simpac’s rugged design makes it especially suitable for use in the rural conditions prevalent at the tea plantations. The scope of some of these projects has been increased to include economisers to further improve the boilers’ efficiency.
John Thompson was also able to satisfy the requirements of a large copper mining operation in Northern Zambia who required steam to reprocess existing mine dumps and were looking for a supplier able to offer a turnkey solution. John Thompson has the engineering and software capability to design entire steam and water reticulation systems, and were able to assist them. They supplied them with three boilers each of 8 t/h steam capacity, which are designed to deal with the fluctuating load profile of the process, together with a pressure deaerator. Each boiler is also equipped with an economiser to enhance operational efficiency.
South-East Asia remains by far the largest export market for the company, which supplies it with custom-designed Europac boilers that can burn the low-grade coal used there. To date this year John Thompson has sold 39 Europac boilers with a total steam capacity of 540 t/h, which already exceeds their 2012 sales into South-East Asia in steam capacity terms.
John Thompson are excited about their export expansion and will continue to target customers globally that value superior design, quality, efficiency, operational reliability and reduced carbon footprint.
