INDUSTRY FOCUS WATER & WASTE TREATMENT SAY CHEESE AND MAKE POWER FROM WASTE
A Movicon SCADA solution from Products4Automation is helping First Milk’s Aspatria creamery generate power from the waste produced during the processing of cheddar cheese
A
new anaerobic digestion plant built by Lake District Biogas at First Milk’s
Aspatria creamery site in Cumbria has been installed to generate bio-methane. It is producing over £3m per year in cost savings, while supplying up to 25% of the creamery’s energy requirements. Providing full control and visualisation of the system is a Movicon SCADA solution provided by Products4Automation. First Milk supplies the retail, food service and milk markets with a wide range of dairy products and ingredients, including a number of regional cheeses. The company is committed to minimising its environmental impact and lowering its energy requirements, and has long had an aerobic plant at the Aspatria facility. However, when the company faced the need to upgrade in order to reduce effluent treatment costs and lower its carbon footprint, it investigated the
potential for an on-site anaerobic digestion plant for its production residues. First Milk worked with funding partners to set up Lake District Biogas to own and operate the plant.
VALUABLE LIQUID The result of this was the installation of a brand new anaerobic digestion plant, designed and commissioned by Clearfleau. The process takes feedstock from the creamery, comprising low strength wash waters such as process rinses,
Liquid from the process is pumped into the AD plant from the creamery, where it is converted into biogas, which is stored in a gas dome until it is required
A premium Cumbria cheddar cheese is produced by the Aspatria creamery
LESS WASTE IS ON EVERYONE’S CHRISTMAS LIST
No food company deliberately creates unnecessary waste. However, the volume of food waste created over the festive period is typically 30% higher than the rest of the year. Fortunately anaerobic digestion is a cost-effective, quick and green way of dealing with this additional waste. Each Christmas, two million turkeys, 11 million potatoes, 17 million sprouts, 12 million carrots and 7.5
million mince pies are wasted, as shopping habits change and consumption rises. The cost of this additional festive food waste to the UK economy is estimated to be £64m per year. In additional to the financial cost there is also an environmental price to pay – leaving food waste to rot in landfill causes the release of methane into the atmosphere, a gas with 25 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide. As waste volumes increase during the festive period, waste hauliers’ capacity fills up fast. Food
companies can suddenly find themselves faced with a mountain of surplus Christmas food waste that their usual waste carrier is unable to take – or will only treat for a vastly inflated fee. However, last Christmas food businesses based in London, Essex, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire sent thousands of tonnes of mince pies, sprouts and turkeys to London-based Anaerobic Digestion plant Willen Biogas. “We helped a number of local food companies with their last-minute Christmas waste problems, arranging collection, transport, depackaging and treatment of their food waste at short notice,” said Chairman, Adrian Williams. “Our cost- competitive waste treatment options can be used for one-off loads or we are happy to discuss longer term contracts depending on our client’s requirements.” Located just off junction 25 of the M25, the 1.5 MW AD plant processes
around 60,000 tonnes of food waste every day – and has capacity to handle any local Christmas surplus. It can handle all types of food waste, including packaged, (with the exception of palletised loads) and accepts deliveries with as little as 24 hours’ notice. Willen Biogas
www.willenbiogas.uk
supplemented by cheese production residue. This liquid is pumped into the anaerobic digestion plant from the creamery where it is converted into biogas, which is stored in a gas dome until it is required. It is then fed into a membrane based upgrade unit that removes carbon dioxide from the gas to produce bio-methane. A key consideration in the design of the plant was the choice of control system, and Clearfleau opted for the Movicon SCADA solution provided by Products4Automation (P4A), with the control and visualisation platform developed and installed by systems integrator Tritec Systems. Project coordinator for Tritec, Laurence Brown commented: “Clearfleau opted for Movicon over a number of competing solutions due to its excellent value for money yet high level of capability. “Movicon also offered the benefits of easy to use web clients, which simplified the route to remote control and visualisation. Additionally it provided a product that could be reused on multiple hardware platforms, providing a simple path for future upgrades.” Movicon SCADA is a stable, easy to use and easy to expand platform with features for control and visualisation. Guaranteeing the reliability needed for mission critical applications, from small HMI to large SCADA servers, it is based on open XML standards and offers features such as secure web services and database support. The result of the development at the
Aspatria site is the first on-site anaerobic digestion plant in the dairy industry in Europe to feed bio-methane into the gas grid that is generated entirely from its own residues.
Operated at the site for Lake District
Biogas by Clearfleau, at full capacity the plant treats 1650m3
per day of process
effluent and cheese residues, generating around 5MW of thermal energy. The plant produces 1000m3
of biogas
per hour, 80% of which is upgraded to bio-methane for injection into the national gas grid. At least 60% of the bio-methane will be used in the creamery for steam generation, with the rest being available to others on the grid. For First Milk the result of the new plant
is reduced energy costs and lower off-site disposal costs, leading to a reduced carbon footprint. First Milk has been able to generate value from its residues, while boosting sustainability and reducing operational costs.
Products4Automation
www.products4automation.co.uk
22 NOVEMBER 2016 | PROCESS & CONTROL
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