An upgrade at CBH Group’s Chadwick site has added four closed circular storages. Photo: CBH Group

THE storage capacity of CBH Group’s Chadwick site has increased by 80,000 tonnes to 655,000t with the construction of four closed circular cells, each with a 20,000t capacity.

This makes Chadwick, in Western Australia’s Esperance port zone and within the Esperance township, one of CBH Group’s largest receival sites.

The new cells have a combined inloading capacity of 1000t per hour, and throughput enhancements including elevators and inloading conveyors have also been installed as part of the upgrade.

This expansion is part of CBH’s ongoing investment in the network that focuses maintenance and capital investment on the core 100 sites that already receive more than 95 per cent of the annual crop.

Chadwick has been identified as one of the core 100 sites as grain production in the Esperance region continues to grow.

The five-year rolling average of receivals within the Esperance Zone has risen by almost 1 million tonnes (Mt), from 1.62Mt in 2005-2009 to 2.54Mt in 2015-2019.

This translates to a compounded annual growth rate of 4.5 per cent.

In the 2018-19 harvest, CBH Group sites in the Esperance zone received 2.4Mt of the 16.4Mt received by the cooperative across the state in its second-biggest harvest on record.

Source: CBH Group