About 100 meters west of National Highway 324 in Beiliu City, a clock tower marked "Ceramics Town" and surrounding buildings with special styles are particularly eye-catching. This is the core area of Beiliu Ceramics Town—Sanhuan Ceramics Town. The first phase of this ceramic industrial cluster, built by Guangxi Sanhuan Enterprise Group Co., Ltd., was put into use in April 2017. It includes a ceramics museum, a world ceramics window, a fully automatic production line, an ancient clock tower, an old captain's bar, and a product experience hall, etc. The existing project covers an area of about 600 mu.

Walking into the Ceramics Museum, a "long river" demonstrating the development history of ceramics unfolds like silk. Here you can learn about the development context of Chinese ceramics, the characteristics of ceramics in various dynasties, and the history of Beiliu ceramics development. Among them,

there are not only unearthed ceramic antiques and Beiliu's contemporary ceramic masterpieces, but also sculpture groups that reproduce the ancient ceramic production process and the scene of the Bailiao kiln in Lingdong, Beiliu. The total area of the museum is 2542 square meters, and the currently open first phase is about 1200 square meters, while the second phase has recently started construction.

Exquisite ceramic tableware exhibited in the "World Ceramics Window"

The "World Ceramics Window", which faces the museum, has a construction area of 2580 square meters. The first phase exhibits the latest products of the Sanhuan Group, and it is planned to display the world's top brand porcelain in the second phase. It showcases many series of daily-use ceramic masterpieces, such as Zhuang brocade, blue and white, magpies on branches, and Jin Shi Fang Yuan. The diverse styles, bright colors, and various styles of ceramic masterpieces shine brightly in different scene combinations, opening people's eyes.

Fully automatic production process, world-leading technology

Fully automatic production of ceramic products

The newly introduced automatic ceramic production line represents the most cutting-edge technology in the world's ceramic production process. Entering the Sanhuan Group's automated demonstration production workshop, which has a total investment of 122 million yuan and imported equipment from Japan, you can see that only two workers are operating on two parallel automatic forming lines. Seven processes in ceramic production, from mud casting, pressing, primary drying, demolding to secondary drying, edge washing, and blank inspection, are all automatically completed. After the workers start the machine, they only need to put the prepared clay into it and pick out the unqualified blanks during production. After the blanks are formed, an automatic conveyor belt transfers the qualified blanks into the kiln car for bisque firing. "The automated demonstration production line has three main characteristics: First, it realizes the automation of the entire production process, reducing labor costs while increasing per capita labor efficiency by 150%; second, it saves energy and reduces emissions. The production process uses clean energy—pipeline natural gas—as fuel, not only reducing noise and eliminating dust pollution, but also reducing energy consumption per unit of industrial added value by 10%; third, it has achieved product structure adjustment and industrial upgrading." A Sanhuan Group staff member introduced that currently, this production line is mainly suitable for producing cup, bowl, and dish-type daily-use ceramic products.

Permeable brick project is about to be put into use, adding "bricks" to sponge city construction

The Sanhuan Group's high-performance ceramic composite permeable brick technology industrialization project, which started construction on October 16, 2017, is also accelerating its construction. The first phase is planned to be put into production in March 2018. The project is planned to be constructed in two phases, with a total investment of 130 million yuan, a planned land area of 215 mu, and the construction of a production line with an annual output of 800,000 square meters of high-performance ceramic composite permeable bricks. After the project is put into production, the annual output value is expected to reach 200 million yuan, adding 105 jobs, and realizing the reuse of waste materials in the ceramic industrial park and improving the comprehensive utilization rate of tailings.

"Permeable bricks are mainly building materials for sponge city ground construction, and are new materials for the construction of sidewalks, large squares, parking lots, etc., in sponge cities." Zhou Qunfeng, a graduate of Jingdezhen Ceramic University and currently employed by Sanhuan Group, introduced that the high-performance ceramic composite permeable brick technology was developed by Jingdezhen Ceramic University, mainly using waste ceramic pieces, tailings, etc., as raw materials. It has strong water absorption capacity, good water permeability, high compressive strength, and functions such as automatic adjustment, smog elimination, and noise reduction.

The Ceramics Town is committed to becoming a comprehensive industrial town integrating daily-use ceramic production, research and development, testing, training, display, ceramic cultural education, production experience, and industrial tourism. It plans to invest 3.08 billion yuan within five years. Currently, the construction of the Guangxi Daily-use Ceramics Engineering Institute, which serves as a research base, is nearing completion. As a research achievement transformation base for cooperation between Sanhuan Group and universities such as Tsinghua University, Jingdezhen Ceramic University, Guangzhou University, and Guilin University of Technology, the institute has a ceramic research institute, a technology center, a testing center, and a master's creative studio, focusing on the research and development of daily-use ceramic materials, formulas, shapes, processes, technologies, and equipment, and providing ceramic testing services. It is expected to be put into use before the 2018 Spring Festival.