Water Conservation in a Dairy Plant

Water has diverse uses in a dairy processing plant. It is used for heating, cooling,washing and cleaning. The consumption of water in these operations generally ranges from three to four liters for processing one liter of milk. However, there are examples where plants has reduced the consumption to one liter water for processing one liter of milk. Water conservation in a dairy processing plant gives dual benefits.

It lowers the water and energy bill of the plant. It also helps to reduce the effluent treatment cost as all the water from the plant reaches the effluent treatment facility before its disposal. With growing awareness, there will be pressures on industries to conserve water. This is being thought as environment friendly and it will partly pave way to sustainable development.For successful implementation of the water conservation measures, the commitment of management is required. Once the management decides to adopt water conservation, it should try to change the mind set of all the people involved. The management should evolve strategies to train and motivate plant personnel to achieve the goals of water conservation. The people involved in it should consider the water as a raw material with a cost and the management should encourage people to innovate.

Every plant should map water usage and decide where water can be moved from one process and used in another process. In some cases, water can be reused without any treatment. In other operations, water might require treatment before it can be used some where else. All water for reuse should be screened to reduce solid buildup. Chlorination is recommended for all reused water, and the residual chlorine level should be increased to 4 mg/l twice a month to make sure that organisms that could harbor in the organic rich environments are killed.

The following water conservation tips can be applied in dairy plant:

•  Use automatic shut off devices on water hoses on steam and water mixing systems.
•  High pressure jets for cleaning cans, tankers and silos will require less water.
•  Install water meters and read them after each shift to identify people who are conserving water.
•  Wherever possible, try to reuse water where possible. For example, hot water used for rinsing after cleaning in a cleaning in place (CIP) cycle could be used for prerinsing in next CIP cycle. Use level controllers to control the pumps. This will avoid overflow from tanks.
•  Frequency of cleaning can be reduced by adopting continuous processes in place of batch processes. Especially in dairy plants producing traditional Indian dairy products, the introduction of continuous machines will lead to greater
• hygiene and less frequent cleaning.
•  Use optical sensors for automatic shut off valves in wash rooms and urinals.
•  Avoid spillage of products and raw materials. Clean the spills before washing with water. Don’t use water jets to sweep the spilled materials in to drain. This is the usual practice in many diary plants.
•  Automation of operations leads to low water consumption. Hence, automate CIP cleaning and other processing operations.