How a dairy giant cut CIP energy costs by up to 10%

The challenge

 

Actors in all industries are striving to lower their energy consumption for financial and environmental reasons, and one of the world’s largest dairies is no exception.

The majority of the energy used at this massive operation is of course consumed in production, but with each cleaning in place (CIP) being about two hours in duration, any opportunities to reduce power consumption during cleaning have a considerable effect on the dairy’s total operating costs when added up over the course of a year.

Magnifying glass in front of water droplet

The solution

Tetra Pak process engineers were running a series of tests at the dairy to optimize its operations and decided to reduce the speed of the separator during CIP in an attempt to reduce energy consumption without affecting the cleaning.

New parameters were entered into the separator control panel – a very specific and precise adjustment dependent on the size of the separator. “We have experienced process engineers with the expertise and long experience needed to do this job, and this is the kind of adjustment that customers could ask us to do,” says Jörgen Cederhag, commercial product manager at Tetra Pak.

The result

By reducing the speed of rotation during CIP, Tetra Pak was able to help the dairy reduce its energy costs during the cleaning process by up to 10%.

And this reduction in energy use was achieved without reducing cleaning performance. In fact, making such a change could actually improve cleaning, as the flow patterns are changed.

“Making our separators – and our customers’ operations – as energy efficient as possible is in our DNA,” says Cederhag.

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