Eco-efficiency for the Dairy Processing Industry - Fact Sheet Sumary

This Toolkit was developed for the Australian dairy processing industry on behalf of Dairy Australia. At the conclusion of the project, industry participants gained exclusive access to a comprehensive Eco-Efficiency Manual, which outlined many of the opportunities available to the industry. Summary fact sheets were also prepared as publicly available resources and these are available for download below

Eco-efficiency for the Dairy Processing Industry

This manual has been developed to help the Australian dairy processing industry increase its competitiveness through increased awareness and uptake of eco-efficiency. The manual seeks to consolidate and build on existing knowledge, accumulated through projects and initiatives that the industry has previously undertaken to improve its use of raw materials and resources and reduce the generation of wastes. Where there is an existing comprehensive report or publication, the manual refers to this for further information. Eco-efficiency is about improving environmental performance to become more efficient and profitable. It is about producing more with less. It involves applying strategies that will not only ensure efficient use of resources and reduction in waste, but will also reduce costs. This chapter outlines the environmental challenges faced by Australian dairy processors. The manual explores opportunities for reducing environmental impacts in relation to water, energy, product yield, solid and liquid waste reduction and chemical use.

Eco-efficiency and dairy processing

The dairy industry is a global industry that provides significant nutritional benefit to many cultures. in australia the industry is especially important economically, being a large export earner, as well as a vital domestic sector. in recent years the sector has come under increased competitive pressure and has restructured to cope with the changes. the industry recently undertook an eco-efficiency project to investigate where business and environmental improvements might be found. the project involved collecting and collating previous project data and surveying 38 companies in different dairy operations, from market milk to dried products. after the survey, 10 sites in two states were visited to discuss eco-efficiency issues in detail with key players. From the surveys, visits and data compilation, a comprehensive manual was prepared to help interested companies find relevant eco-efficiency data easily and assist them in the implementation process. ten fact sheets were also produced covering the topics of water management, water recycling and re-use, refrigeration optimisation, boiler optimisation, biogas, the use of treated wastewater, yield optimisation and product recovery, optimisation of ciP systems, chemical use and membranes the project highlighted the large amount of technical and engineering expertise within the sector that could result in eco-efficiency outcomes and also identified the opportunities that exist for changes to occur in some operations to save energy, input raw materials and water.

Significance of frictional heating for effects of high pressure homogenisation on milk

High pressure homogenisation (HPH) is a novel dairy processing tool, which has many effects on enzymes, microbes, fat globules and proteins in milk. The effects of HPH on milk are due to a combination of shear forces and frictional heating of the milk during processing; the relative importance of these different factors is unclear, and was the focus of this study. The effect of milk inlet temperature (in the range 10-50 degrees C) on residual plasmin, alkaline phosphatase, lactoperoxidase and lipase activities in raw whole bovine milk homogenised at 200 MPa was investigated. HPH caused significant heating of the milk; outlet temperature increased in a linear fashion (0(.)5887 degrees C/degrees C, R-2 =0-9994) with increasing inlet temperature. As milk was held for 20 s at the final temperature before cooling, samples of the same milk were heated isothermally in glass capillary tubes for the same time/temperature combinations. Inactivation profiles of alkaline phosphatase in milk were similar for isothermal heating or HPH, indicating that loss of enzyme activity was due to heating alone. Loss of plasmin and lactoperoxidase activity in HPH milk, however, was greater than that in heated milk. Large differences in residual lipase activities in milks subjected to heating or HPH were observed due to the significant increase in lipase activity in homogenised milk. Denaturation of beta-lactoglobulin was more extensive following HPH than the equivalent heat treatment. Inactivation of plasmin was correlated with increasing fat/serum interfacial area but was not correlated with denaturation of beta-lactoglobulin. Thus, while some effects of HPH on milk are due to thermal effects alone, many are induced by the combination of forces and heating to which the milk is exposed during HPH.