FEATURE FOCUS: FOOD & BEVERAGE


A LEGEND IN BOURBON MODERNISES FOR INCREASED PRODUCTION WHILE MAINTAINING A TRADITION OF QUALITY


bourbon whiskey. Jim Beam was looking to modernise sections of their facility to maximise throughput while respecting equipment and process constraints. In order to achieve this objective, reductions in process and quality variance would be required to allow the plant to push closer to their operational limits, increasing throughput while maintaining product integrity. The application will provide real-time model predictive control through the implementation of the technology components. The Pavilion8 Controller implements


The Jim Beam Distillery in Clermont, Kentucky has been producing some of the world’s finest spirits for more than 75 years. At the Clermont distillery, over 90 million bottles of spirits are produced annually and shipped to more than 200 countries worldwide


A


number of leading bourbon brands are distilled at the facility: Jim


Beam Bourbon, Jim Beam Black, and the ultra-premium Small Batch Bourbons: Basil Hayden, Knob Creek, Baker's and Booker's. More than 600,000 barrels of bourbon


are aged in the 27 rack houses on the distillery grounds making the Jim Beam Clermont plant one of the largest in North America. It is said that for bourbon, 100 per cent


of the colour and 60 per cent of the flavour comes from the barrel. The other 40 per cent of the flavour results from the grains in the mash bill, the yeast, the fermentation conditions and the distillation proofs of the low wine and the high wine. Maintaining the low and high wine proofs ensures that the desired congeners, substances, other than alcohol, produced during fermentation that affect the flavour, are preserved in the high wine, while undesirable congeners are removed. The grains listed in the mash bill are


cooked and then fermented using yeast to produce ‘distiller’s beer’. This distiller’s beer, which is about nine per cent


10 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2019 | IRISH MANUFACTURING


alcohol, is fed to a continuous, multi- stage, column still, called the beer still, where the alcohol is concentrated in the vapor leaving the top of the column. The vapor is condensed and the resulting ‘low wine’, which is about 60 per cent alcohol or 120 proof, is stored in the retention tank. The remainder of the distiller’s beer leaves the bottom of the still as ‘thick slop’. The low wine goes through a final, single stage of distillation in the ‘doubler’. The vapor from the doubler is condensed and the resulting ‘high wine’, which is about 65 per cent alcohol or 130 proof, is stored in cisterns until it is diluted or ‘proofed’ to the desired concentration before being put into new, charred, oak barrels. To avoid losing any alcohol, the side


streams collected from the beer still, the bottoms from the doubler, as well as other waste streams from the distillery are collected in a tank and fed to a small column still, known as the ‘heads and tails still’. The alcohol is concentrated in the vapor leaving the top of the still and is condensed with the low wine. In the last few years, there has been a boom in the worldwide consumption of


Jim Beam implements Model Predictive Control at Clermont, Kentucky Distillery


multivariable control with constraint handling, feed forward, decoupling and dead-time compensation. Process models are used to optimise controller actions. Where conventional Model Predictive Control (MPC) uses linear models, The Pavilion8 Controller allows nonlinear models to be used. The Pavilion8 Controller calculates recommended set points for lower level process control loops, typically PID loops, to optimise real-time control performance. These controllers can be placed on or off MPC control by the board operator. More complex strategies may be implemented by configuring one Pavilion8 Controller to write set points to another Pavilion8 Controller’s controlled variables.


THE APPLICATION FOR JIM BEAM • Maximises feed to the beer still to


increase throughput, up to the process and quality constraints. • Manipulates the steam and reflux


flows to the beer still to maintain the low wine proof and ensure that no alcohol is lost in the thick slop. • Manipulates the steam flow to the


doubler to maintain the high wine proof. • Manipulates the steam flow to the


heads and tails still to ensure that all alcohol in the collected streams is recovered. • Manages the material flows through


the distillery to maintain the material balance (tank levels, etc.) freeing the operators to focus on more complex tasks.


THE RESULTS • Allows operators to focus on high


Rockwell Automation www.rockwellauto mation.com T: +44 1908 627 889


value tasks • 60 per cent Decreased Variability


while Maintaining Proofs • Stable Distillery Operation, Better


Product Quality & Improved Distillation Yield


/ IRISHMANUFACTURING


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