Aspen Plus-Validated Design and Techno-Economic Evaluation of a Honeyed Bitter-Kola (Garcinia kola) Tablet Manufacturing Plant

This work presents a rigorously engineered Aspen Plus-validated process design and pharmaceutical techno-economic assessment for the industrial-scale production of honeyed bitter-kola (Garcinia kola Heckel) tablets in Nigeria. The study integrates advanced steady-state solids-process simulation with pharmaceutical manufacturing principles to establish the technical feasibility, economic viability, process safety, and regulatory compliance of a 50 kg h⁻¹ phytopharmaceutical production facility. A comprehensive digital process model comprising eight interconnected unit operations — hammer crushing, pin milling, tray pre-drying, V-cone blending, high-shear wet granulation, oscillating size reduction, fluid-bed drying, and rotary tablet compression — was developed and validated under strict component and mass-balance constraints. The converged Aspen Plus simulation achieved near-ideal global mass-balance closure with relative error below 1 × 10⁻⁴, demonstrating exceptional process consistency and computational robustness. The facility delivers 53.89 kg h⁻¹ of finished honey-bitter-kola tablets, corresponding to approximately 776 million 500 mg dosage units annually at an overall production yield of 90.4 wt%. A pharmaceutical-grade techno-economic evaluation indexed to 2025 economic conditions was conducted using CEPCI-adjusted capital costing, Nigerian utility pricing, and contemporary manufacturing economics. The analysis estimates a fixed-capital investment of $2.65 million and a total capital investment of $3.05 million, with annual manufacturing expenditure of $2.56 million against projected wholesale revenues of $4.27 million. Discounted cash-flow analysis over a 15-year operational horizon at 12% weighted average cost of capital confirms strong commercial viability, yielding a net present value of $5.71 million, an internal rate of return of 41.7%, and a discounted payback period of approximately three years. Beyond economic performance, the study incorporates an integrated pharmaceutical risk and safety framework through detailed HAZOP assessment, Dow Fire-and-Explosion Index analysis, and Mond Index evaluation, all of which indicate acceptable industrial safety classifications without Category-A residual risks. Sensitivity analysis further identifies tablet selling price and raw Garcinia kola feedstock cost as the dominant economic drivers influencing project profitability and investment resilience. The proposed facility architecture aligns with internationally recognized pharmaceutical and herbal-manufacturing standards, including ICH Q7/Q8/Q9/Q10 guidelines, WHO TRS-1052 GMP requirements for herbal medicines, FDA continuous-manufacturing guidance, and current NAFDAC herbal-medicine registration regulations. Collectively, the work establishes a scalable, regulation-ready, and economically sustainable framework for advancing indigenous phytopharmaceutical manufacturing within Nigeria’s emerging bioeconomy and natural-products industry.