Construction of a grain storage silo

The cereal collection network is made up of cooperatives and trading companies. Spread over the whole of France, it represents more than 9,000 collection and storage centers. Total storage capacity exceeds 40 million metric tons (Mt), to which must be added 13 Mt of inland storage and port shipping.

Storage capacity in France has been steadily declining over the past 10 years. The need for additional capacity is currently around 9 Mt out of a total capacity of around 60 Mt. To respond to this situation, the industry has decided to implement a plan to develop grain storage in France, the "silo plan", with an initial target increase of 5 Mt.

Among other things, this plan raises the need to rethink the way in which storage capacity is built. Recent years have been marked by major changes in health safety, logistics organization and energy management objectives.

The type of storage system best suited to your needs must be chosen according to several criteria:

• total storage capacity required ;

• unit storage capacity required, and consequently cell size and islanding requirements;

• the cell and silo turnover rate, which defines the type of emptying and sets personnel constraints;

• reception rate ;

• operating costs ;

• maintenance ;

• personnel safety ;

• investment cost ;

• storage conditions ;

• type of product ;

• hygiene aspects ;

• aging.

These different criteria are detailed in this article, along with the advantages and disadvantages of each of the resulting solutions.

A specific section deals with the technical-economic aspect, integrating investment, operating and maintenance costs. Orders of magnitude per housed ton are given for different types of silos.

The administrative procedures involved in building a grain storage facility are also presented. The success of a construction project depends on integrating these administrative deadlines right from the start.