You can get e-magazine links on WhatsApp. Click here TOP NEWS Energy conservation techniques in dairy industry Thursday, 28 July, 2022, 16 : 00 PM [IST] Arvind Kumawat, Kavita Kumari Solanki, Ashok Kumar, Naveen Jose The significance of energy efficiency has been rapidly growing in the last few years. This is mainly due to increased energy cost and exhaustion of natural resources (like coal, petrol, diesel). India is largest milk producing country in the world with 210 million tonne of milk production annually.   Milk can be converted to various dairy products such as cheese, curd and ice creams. As the per capita milk consumption in the country is increasing the need to produce more amount of milk is gaining importance. The dairy industry handling a large amount of milk uses energy in several forms such as steam, hot water, compressed air, chilled water and electricity. The dairies have to focus on both aspects of maintaining a high product quality and concurrently reducing the production cost. These aspects can be met through investments in energy conservation, which can include the purchase of energy-conservation technologies and the implementation of plant-wide energy conservation practices. Energy conservation methods also reduce emission of greenhouse gases and other important air pollutants. As of now, energy crisis and hike in the prices of energy is the major problem faced by the world and with depleting energy sources it is of much importance to enhance equipment efficiency in dairy industry by implementing various thermal performance increasing and energy conservation techniques in their plants. In accordance with the alternative and innovative means adopted for the milk processing plants one must also consider various energy conservation techniques in the existing plants in operation. Major energy uses Many activities are involved in the manufacturing of dairy products such as: filtration, standardisation, separation, homogenisation, pasteurisation, thermisation, concentration, drying, clarification, cleaning-in-place, testing, packaging and storage. To conduct these processes, billions of money is spent on purchase of fuel and electricity. The electricity is used to drive process motors, fans, pumps, compressed air systems, process cooling, freezing, cold storage, building lighting and HVAC systems. The largest share of fuel consumed by the dairy industry is used for direct process heating and steam generation via boiler systems. The fuels used include natural gas, coal, residual oil, and distillate oils. The most energy-intensive activities involve heat generation. Other opportunities to save energy involve improving the efficiency of evaporators, compressors, refrigeration, air conditioning, and Cleaning-in-Place (CIP) systems. Innovative technologies for reduction of energy consumption These are the innovative technologies for reduction of energy consumption: Expert Computer Control SystemPartial HomogenisationNon-Thermal Pasteurisation MethodsMicrofiltrationPulse Electrical Field EffectsHigh- and Low-Intensity UV for LiquidsEnzyme-based cleaners to improve CIP Just-In-Time (JIT) Dairy Manufacturing ConceptHeat pumping of waste process heatElectrolysed Oxidised Water Benefits of saving energy Improving energy efficiency can benefit your business and the environment by reducing energy costs through actions such as purchasing more efficient equipment, reducing the environmental impact of your business through minimising energy related greenhouse gas emissions extending equipment life, reducing operating costs and avoiding downtime through increased energy efficiency and improved maintenance regimes improving your business reputation and employee satisfaction. Energy conservation techniques Refrigeration and AC - Arresting cold air leakage, reducing refrigeration load by keeping diffusers outside the room, monitoring system performance, ensuring proper refrigerant charge, checking for refrigerant contamination, automated controls, segregation of refrigeration systems, efficient piping design and insulation, minimising heat sources in cold storage areas, use of vapour absorption machine (VAM), operating ice bank system at night when atmospheric temperature is low.Steam and Hot Water- Correct selection and sizing of traps, group trapping, better insulation of steam lines/valves/tanks, improve condensate recovery, flash vessels, avoiding of steam leaks, minimise operating pressure, avoid unnecessary lengths, use of condensate as hot water.Boiler - Air/fuel ratio controls, tuning of boilers, pre-heat combustion air, air atomisation of oil instead of steam, turbulators in fire tube types, conversion to energy-efficient boilers, convert to less costly fuels, waste heat recovery, efficient soot blowing, automatic stack damper, avoid infiltration of air, blow down heat recovery, solar water heating system.Spray Drier - Operating temperature optimisation, exhaust heat recovery, strategic placement of air intake, use of multiple stage drying, inlet air monitoring, use of crystallisation (dry whey only), heat recovery from product, using other concentration techniques like membrane filtration.Compressed Air - Prevention of leaks in compressed air system, restoration of generation capacity of air compressor, reduce compressor delivery pressure wherever possible.Water conservation - Reuse of water from coolers, heat exchangers, evaporators and so on, condensate recovery.Pasteuriser/Heat Treatment- Use of high regeneration efficiency (90-95%) pasteurisers, reclamation/adding plates, heat exchanger enhancement techniques, compact immersion tube heat exchangers.Power System - Transformer loading, determination of plant load & load factor analysis, improving power factor, identification and minimising transformer losses, demand management & controls, parallel operation of DG/TG sets with grid, use of harmonic filters near equipments.Fans & Pumps - Use high efficiency impeller along with cone, impeller derating using small diameter impeller, use of energy efficient hollow FRP impeller with aero foil design in cooling towers.Spray Drying - Operating temperature optimisation, exhaust heat recovery, strategic placement of air intake, use of multiple stage drying, inlet air monitoring, use of crystallisation (dry whey only), heat recovery from product, using other concentration techniques like membrane filtration.Evaporator – Maintenance, mechanical vapour recompression, thermal vapour recompression, multiple effect evaporators, concentration using membrane filtration.The dairy processing industry spends huge amount on purchase of fuels and electricity, making energy a substantial cost driver for the industry. Energy efficiency enhancement is an important way to reduce these costs and to increase predictable earnings in the face of ongoing energy price volatility. The concern towards environment and increasing price of fuels has raised the alarm towards energy-efficient measures. A dedicated and planned energy management programme will help to detect and contrivance energy efficiency measures and practices across the organisation and ensure unremitting improvement. (Kumawat is assistant manager, Jaipur Zila Dugdh Utpadak Sahakari Sangh Ltd, Jaipur; Solanki is assistant manager, Jaipur Zila Dugdh Utpadak Sahakari Sangh Ltd, Jaipur; Kumar is assistant manager, Rajasthan Cooperative Dairy Federation Ltd, Jaipur; Jose belongs to National Dairy Research Institute, Bengaluru)   This page allows you to send the current page to your friend. Your Friends Email ID: Your Email ID: Post Your Comment * Name :     *  Email :       Website :   Comments :           Captcha :  

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