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Dairy
Eurodia has a good
experience in whey demineralization. Its first plant was built in 1989.
Since then, 27 other plants have been supplied. Eurodia provides complete
processes to obtain demineralized whey as final product, or as an
intermediary for other value-added products, such as lactose or whey
proteins.
The benefits of whey
demineralization are:
¨ To increase the yield of valuable products
¨ To preserve the product qualities
¨ Lower operating costs
¨ To minimize future process difficulties due to
high levels of minerals and microorganisms. This leads to a better
crystallization by the reduction of interstitial space.
¨ To improve the efficiency of each selected
process
In its whey
demineralization plants, the Eurodia processes are designed to:
¨ Produce any rate of whey demineralization (from
50 to 90%)
¨ Produce demin powder from any type of whey
¨ Reduce the operating costs (longer membrane life
increase, lower water consumption)
¨ Produce high quality whey powder
The Eurodia processes
take advantage of three of its technologies:
¨ Nanofiltration
¨ Electrodialysis
¨ Ion Exchange resin
Each technology has its
own advantages and inconveniences:
¨ Nanofiltration
o Advantages:
§ Concentration of dry solids
§ Partial demineralization (removal of monovalent
ions)
o Inconveniences:
§ Increase the concentration of bivalents
§ High potential for microorganism development
¨ Electrodialysis
o Advantages:
§ Low pollution load (no salt added)
§ Require no chemicals for regeneration
§ Does not have ion selectivity
§ Can achieve several demineralization rates
o Inconveniences:
§ No concentration effect
¨ Ion exchange resin
o Advantages:
§ Remove all ions
§ Low capital costs
o Inconveniences:
§ High volume of effluents
§ High amounts of chemicals for regeneration
§ High losses of valuable products (proteins)
The original idea of
Eurodia/Ameridias engineers is to use a combination of these technologies.
Thus this combination allows
¨ The lowest operating costs
¨ To preserve the quality of valuable products by
avoiding microbiological development and thermal shocks
¨ To maintain as high as possible the yield of dry
solids and products
¨ To take into account the downstream process steps
(evaporation, WPC, lactose, spray drying
)
¨ To optimize the technology, materials,
instruments
¨ To meet the requirements of FDA and 3A
¨ To meet the requirements for processing Organic
Whey
Capabilities of the Eurodia
demineralization processes, starting from liquid whey:
|
PROCESSES
|
|
|
NF
|
ED
|
EUDEM
70
EUDEM90
|
|
DEMIN
RATE
|
35 %
|
EFFICIENCY
|
+ + +
|
+ + +
+
|
|
|
MICROBIOLOGY
QUALITY
|
-
|
-
|
|
|
MEMBRANE
LIFE
|
6
000h
|
8
000h
|
|
|
50 %
|
EFFICIENCY
|
|
+ + +
|
+ + +
+
|
|
MICROBIOLOGY
QUALITY
|
|
-
|
+ + +
|
|
MEMBRANE
LIFE
|
|
6
000h
|
NF 6
000h
ED 12
000h
|
|
70 %
|
EFFICIENCY
|
|
+ +
|
+ + +
+
|
|
MICROBIOLOGY
QUALITY
|
|
- -
|
+ + +
+
|
|
MEMBRANE
LIFE
|
|
5
000h
|
NF 6
000h
ED 12
000h
|
|
90 %
|
EFFICIENCY
|
|
|
+ + +
+
|
|
MICROBIOLOGY
QUALITY
|
|
- - -
|
+ + +
+
|
|
MEMBRANE
LIFE
|
|
2
500h
|
NF 10
000h
ED 17
000h
|
This Table illustrates
on average the capabilities of operating plants.
Calculation of operating and investment
costs
(in Euros)
|
DEMIN
RATE
|
PROCESSES
|
OPERATING
COSTS
|
INVESTMENT
COSTS
|
TOTAL
COSTS
|
|
50 %
|
ED
ALONE
|
0.093
/kg
|
|
0.093
/kg
|
|
EUDEM
70
NF
WHEY
|
0.061
/kg
|
0.036
/kg
|
0.097
/kg
|
|
EUDEM
90
NF
WHEY
|
0.040
/kg
|
0.044
/kg
|
0.084
/kg
|
|
70 %
|
ED
ALONE
|
0.130
/kg
|
|
0.130
/kg
|
|
EUDEM
70
NF
WHEY
|
0.080
/kg
|
0.030
/kg
|
0.110
/kg
|
|
EUDEM
90
NF
WHEY
|
0.049
/kg
|
0.047
/kg
|
0.096
/kg
|
The operating costs have
been calculated taking into account:
¨ For each process:
o The same final product dry solids
o The same final product demin rates
o Product yields
¨ For each step:
o Consumption of chemicals
o Water consumption
o Electricity consumption
o Membranes/resins life
o Electrode consumption
The investment costs
have been calculated assuming a 3-year depreciation, excluding membrane,
labor, and raw material costs.
For more information about the
technology / Reference
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