References

Sector: Foods and luxury food

Optimal utilization of production raw materials

– safe, profitable, compliant with regulations

New construction of a production building for milk powder manufacturing
Guarantee of all quality and safety standards
Integrated system solution coupled with existing automation

The challenge

One of the most efficient and modern dairy companies in Germany converts milk into milk powder. The milk can thus be stored and transported and can also be produced in different qualities. The spectrum ranges from skim milk powder to whole milk powder. The high-quality milk is processed into top-quality milk powder in special drying towers. Here, the company faces two major challenges: first, there is a high risk of explosion in the drying tower. If a certain temperature limit is exceeded, CO2 must be fed into the system immediately. Second, food production regulations stipulate that the plant must be regularly cleaned at strict intervals to prevent the development and spread of bacteria. This is particularly true here, as milk powder is also used to produce baby food.

In order to completely eliminate risks and errors, in the future, the control and monitoring of the plant will be automated rather than carried out by people.

Reliable implementation

onoff gained a great deal of experience with the particularities of this sector in previous projects with the dairy industry, and is very familiar with the strict regulations of the food industry. As an automation expert, onoff was thus the ideal partner. onoff developed a precisely customized solution for the customer that continuously measures and monitors the temperature in the drying tower – and if necessary, immediately initiates measures to regulate it. The automated solution thus shifts the great responsibility for preventing explosions or contamination from humans to the machine. In addition, the elimination of time-consuming activities involving manual control of the drying towers means employees can now be deployed much more effectively.

“When it gets too hot, things have to move fast.”

  • PCS 7 with two AS 417F/H, a redundant server, two clients and one ES
  • Recipe and batch system PM-Control and PM-Quality
  • Coupling with the existing automation systems

Focus on customer requirements

The customer’s requirements and experiences were decisive for the conception and implementation of the new solution. onoff was able to fully meet their expectations. The production of milk powder allows all components of the milk to be used and resources to be conserved.