235

A publication of

CHEMICAL ENGINEERING TRANSACTIONS

VOL. 52, 2016 The Italian Association
of Chemical Engineering
Online at www.aidic.it/cet
Guest Editors: Petar Sabev Varbanov, Peng-Yen Liew, Jun-Yow Yong, Jiří Jaromír Klemeš, Hon Loong Lam
Copyright © 2016, AIDIC Servizi S.r.l.,
ISBN 978-88-95608-42-6; ISSN 2283-9216 DOI: 10.3303/CET1652040

Total Site Utility Systems Optimisation

for Milk Powder Production
Timothy G. Walmsley*a, Martin J. Atkinsa, Michael R.W. Walmsleya, James R.
Nealea, Matthias Philippb, Gregor Schummb, Ron-Hendrik Peeselb
a
Energy Research Centre, School of Engineering, University of Waikato, Private Bag 3105, Hamilton, New Zealand
b
Universität Kassel, Dep. Umweltgerechte Produkte und Prozesse, Kurt-Wolters-Straße 3, 34125 Kassel, Germany
timgw@waikato.ac.nz

This study applies the Total Site Heat Integration method, in conjunction with a detailed process and utility
model, to investigate three methods to increase the energy efficiency of the utility supply system for milk
powder production. Sequentially explored opportunities are: (1) increasing boiler efficiency through
condensing economisers, (2) waste heat recovery from the chiller unit, and (3) Combined Heat and Power
(CHP) for electricity production. The basis for the analysis is the anticipated future milk powder process
design, which incorporates results from recent studies that have focused on improving the process design and
integration of the heat treatment and evaporator systems and recovering heat from the spray dryer exhaust,
which show a combined specific fuel consumption reduction of 29.6 % and a relatively small increase in
electricity use of 4.5 %. To maximise boiler efficiency, the study concludes that a condensing economiser for
the flue gas can be indirectly matched with heating fluidised bed air flows through the boiler condensate
system, which results in specific fuel use reduction of 227 MJ/t p. Chiller waste heat can be upgraded and
integrated as a heat source to replace the equivalent specific fuel use of 101 MJ/tp through integration with the
site low temperature hot water loop. By designing the steam system to maximise electricity generation in a
new turbine, results show that 51 % of the site’s electricity demand may be satisfied by CHP. The combined
effect of implementing these three utility systems opportunities is a specific fuel use of 3,868 MJ/tp, of which
530 MJ/tp result from electricity production, and a specific grid electricity demand of 113.4 kWh/tp.

1. Introduction
Conversion of raw milk into powdered milk is an energy intensive process requiring steam heating, chilling and
electrical utilities. The milk powder process has four main processing steps: milk separation, heat treatment,
evaporation, and spray drying. Over the past four decades, there has been significant progress in the energy
efficiency of milk powder plants. Specific fuel consumptions have decreased from about 12,000 MJ/t p of
powder to between 5,000 – 6,000 MJ/tp, while the specific electricity uses are in the order of 150 to 400 kWh/tp
(Ramírez et al., 2006). The absolute fuel and electricity use and split depends on the installed technology, the
degree of heat integration, the scale of production, and the utility system efficiency.
Significant improvements to the energy efficiency of the heat treatment, evaporation and spray dryer process
through process redesign and additional heat recovery have been reported in literature. Using the appropriate
placement principle for a heat pump, Walmsley et al. (2016) demonstrated the optimal use of vapour
recompression technology in the process and network design of the combined heat treatment and evaporation
systems. The result was a dramatic 78 % reduction in steam use at the expense of a 16 % increase in
electricity. For spray dryer systems, exhaust heat recovery presents another significant opportunity to increase
energy efficiency. Walmsley et al. (2015b) developed a dryer exhaust heat recovery model, which included
economic calculations and fouling predictions, and found that a 14 % reduction in steam through heat
recovery was economic for the given site. Beyond these two opportunities, there are more prospects to reduce
energy use in milk powder production.

Please cite this article as: Walmsley T. G., Atkins M. J., Walmsley M. R. W., Neale J. R., Philipp M., Schumm G., Peesel R.-H., 2016, Total site
utility systems optimisation for milk powder production, Chemical Engineering Transactions, 52, 235-240 DOI:10.3303/CET1652040
236

Total Site Heat Integration (TSHI) provides a graphical method for the selection, design, and optimisation of
utility systems (Klemeš, 2013). With respect to milk powder factories, TSHI may be applied to target the
minimum boiler flue gas temperature (thus maximising boiler efficiency) and Combined Heat and Power (CHP)
production for a site. Even though the milk powder process can have a low Pinch Temperature, very few sites
in New Zealand have steam boilers equipped with condensing economisers. Likewise, out of the 82 NZ dairy
processing sites, only four use CHP technology – NZ Heat Plant Database cited in (Walmsley et al., 2015a).
Given the low uptake, it is valuable to explore options for maximising CHP as a means for improving and
developing a more attractive business case. Such options include raising the initial steam pressure, the
addition of new steam pressure levels to improve the overall heat and powder cascade (Sun et al., 2013), and
the complete design optimisation of a new CHP system (Manesh et al., 2012).
Another area in the utility system that can contribute to energy cost reduction is waste heat recovery from
chiller units. In most instances this opportunity requires an additional compressor unit to increase the pressure
of the chiller’s condenser, thereby upgrading its heat so that it may be integrated to fulfil process heat
demands. TSHI can aid the selection of the condenser pressure and identify the method for its integration,
either direct with process stream and/or via the hot water utility network, using the appropriate placement
principle for heat pumps (Yang et al., 2014).
The aim of this paper is to investigate methods to increase the energy efficiency of utility supply operations
that are required for milk powder factories given the proposed future designs of the heat treatment,
evaporation, and spray dryer processes. In particular the three investigated energy reduction opportunities for
the milk powder plant utility system are: (1) increasing boiler efficiency through condensing economisers, (2)
waste heat recovery from the chiller unit, and (3) Combined Heat and Powder (CHP) for electricity production.

2. Methods
2.1 Milk powder plant model
A comprehensive heat and mass balance process and utility model of a milk powder factory has been
implemented in an ExcelTM spreadsheet and validated against industrial data from NZ’s current milk powder
plant design as well as an anticipated future plant design. Model results are based on a plant capacity of
30 tp/h, which can be modified for other desired capacities. The model plant without modification has a specific
fuel consumption of 5,200 MJ/tp and an electrical use of 210 kWh/tp. These are applied as a comparative
baseline for the future plant design and the utility optimisation opportunities. The future plant design
incorporates a redesigned evaporation system (Walmsley et al., 2016) and dryer exhaust heat recovery
(Walmsley et al., 2015b).
2.2 Steam boiler and back pressure steam turbine model
The natural gas steam boiler model, including a deaerator, blowdown vessel and feed water pump, was
modelled using Excel Add-in JSteamTM (www.inverseproblem.co.nz). TSHI techniques are applied to
maximise boiler efficiency. The composite curve of boiler flue gas (initially at 140 °C), after generating steam
and preheating combustion air using a standard economiser, is shifted and pinched against the Total Site
Source Profile to target the minimum flue gas temperature, which leads to maximising boiler efficiency.
For CHP, the back pressure steam turbine model estimated performance using the M-P turbine model
(Medina-Flores and Picón-Núñez, 2010), which is the best available empirical correlation for single and
multiple extraction turbines. Where a turbine (or steam drive) rating falls below the M-P turbine model’s lower
limit, the model estimates work assuming an isentropic efficiency of 65 %.
2.3 Ammonia chiller model
The chiller model uses the vapour compression cycle with ammonia as the working fluid, a compressor
efficiency of 53 %, a condenser pressure of 2,000 kPa, and a Co-efficient of Performance (COP) of 2.3.
Thermophysical properties are called from REFPROPTM (http://www.nist.gov/srd/nist23.cfm). The combined
chiller/heat pump unit uses a higher condenser pressure (2,600 kPa) that has a saturation temperature of
60 °C. The COP of this unit is 1.8 for chilling and 2.8 for heating. Since the process requires a chiller, it’s
useful to understand the performance of expending additional electricity to upgrade the condenser heat. The
marginal COP* for heating in the combined system may be defined by:

QH ( HP)  Qrej .
COPH*  (1)
WHP  WLP
Where subscripts HP refers to a high pressure condenser, LP refers to a low pressure condenser, and rej
refers to rejected heat. If all the condenser heat is able to heat process streams (i.e. the rejected heat is zero),
then the marginal COP of heating is 13.4.
 237

3. Envisaging future energy efficiency opportunities for the utility system

This section explores three energy efficiency opportunities in the utility system for the future milk powder
process design (1.0), as previously described.
3.1 Maximising boiler energy efficiency through condensing economisers
Standard industrial steam boilers for milk powder production operate at 40 bar (250 °C saturated) and are
fitted with an economiser. The economiser preheats pressurised boiler feed water before it enters the main
evaporation tubes. Depending on the boiler design the flue gas enters the economiser at up to 350 °C and
leaves above the acid dew point at 140 °C. An additional condensing economiser can be installed to capture
more flue gas heat. There is also a water dew point, which for a natural gas boiler (as considered in this study)
is about 60 °C while a coal fired boiler is 40 °C. Extracting additional heat, both sensible and latent (if useful),
maximises boiler efficiency and minimises fuel use.
Two sinks within the boiler plant to match with the flue gas in a condensing economiser are the combined
condensate return / make-up water flow and the combustion air inlet. The condensate returns from servicing
the process at 85 °C, and once combined with the make-up water, the temperature decreases to 68 °C for the
current process design and 82 °C for the future design. This difference in temperature is due to current plant
design having a lower condensate return percent compared to the expected percent in the future design (74 %
to 94 %). The future process design uses less direct steam injection and therefore has a higher condensate
return percentage. Matching the combined water flow with the flue gas has a maximum duty of 69 MJ/tp.
Preheating the combustion is another option, but is undesirable due to poor heat transfer coefficients of gas to
gas heat exchange. Further sink options beyond the boiler system may be found using TSHI techniques.
The source profile of the Total Site Profiles together with targeted steam and hot water utility profiles may be
pinched with the shifted boiler flue gas flow using a ΔTcont of 12.5 °C. Figure 1 plots these source, sink and
utility profiles for the future process design. The targeted final flue gas temperature is 58.4 °C and the
additional heat extraction from the flue gas is 180 MJ/tp. The target is influenced by the hot water utility
temperature selection. The additional heat extraction from the flue gas has the knock on effect of reducing
boiler fuel consumption to meet the process heat demand, which in turns means the flue gas flow rate slightly
decreases. As a result the process and utility model becomes an important tool to capture these
superimposing effects.
The hot water utility system, as shown in Figure 1, is one sink option for the condensing economiser. This
option would require additional piping from the boiler house to the processing buildings. At present the boiler
supplies the process with only two steam pressure levels (using a let-down valve) and returns hot condensate
in a separate line. Another sink option that requires minimal additional piping between the boiler and process
locations is to return cold condensate (35 °C) by placing the heat in a process sink. For the future process
design, the Fluidised Bed air flows may be matched with the hot condensate flows to achieve a duty of
232 MJ/tp. The cold condensate, combined with a small amount of make-up water, then extracts an additional
197 MJ/tp in a condensing economiser. The overall result is a specific fuel reduction of 227 MJ/t p, which is
actually greater than the initial integration target.
250
HPS

200
MPS
Boiler
150 Flue Gas
T** [°C]

(Tdew=59.9°C)

Site Sink
100 Profile
HTHW
Tt(real) = 58.4 °C

50

LTHW

0
-500 0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000 3,500
H [MJ/tp]

Figure 1: Target for the minimum boiler flue gas temperature by pinching the flue gas profile with the site hot
water utility system
238

3.2 Chiller waste heat upgrading and recovery

The chiller system is an essential utility supply operation of chilled water for process cooling. The condenser is
normally air-cooled in a closed loop. With ammonia as the working fluid, the condenser operates at 2.0 MPa,
which is a saturation temperature of 49 °C. By increasing the compression to 2.6 MPa, the saturation
temperature increases to 60 °C and the heat may be integrated into the LTHW, which has a supply
temperature of 55 °C. This can be achieved by installing a second compression stage.
Figure 2 presents how a combine chiller/heat pump system appropriately integrates with the Site Source and
Sink Profiles. The Site Sink Profile excludes the portion of heat demand for the Fluidised Bed air streams that
is satisfied indirectly through the condensate system using the boiler flue gas. The target boiler heat
displacement is 85 MJ/tp and its integration results in a specific fuel reduction of 101 MJ/tp. Electrical use
increases by 1.8 kWh/tp, which is a marginal COPH of 13. In the future plant design, the LTHW system is used
to heat HVAC air flows and direct use water applications such as process cleaning, tanker washing, and
lactose powder reconstitution.
At some existing dairy factories there is a substantial amount of waste heat, not just from the chiller unit,
rejected at about 40 °C. Future work will look at both the integration of heat pumps using chiller and other
waste heat, as well as the internal design of the heat pump cycle to match process demand profiles while
maximising its COP.
100

80 HTHW

Heat Pump
60 Condenser
LTHW Site Sink Profile
T** [°C]

(after flue gas heat recovery)

40

Site Source
20
Profile

CHW
0
-100 -50 0 50 100 150 200 250 300
H [MJ/tp]

Figure 2: Combined chiller (through chilled water) and heat pump condenser integration with Total Site
Profiles. Note: axes are zoomed; only a portion of the Total Site Profiles is shown

3.3 Combined heat and power

The final investigated opportunity within the utility system is CHP using a back pressure steam turbine for
electricity production. Using the existing two steam levels and a turbine to drop the required steam from 40 bar
to 10 bar for the MPS demand gives an electricity production of 46.4 kWh/tp, which for a production rate of
30 tp/h is a 1.4 MW turbine, at an isentropic efficiency of 67 %. A turbine installation for only 1.4 MW of
electricity generation struggles to find economic justification. Alternatively, plant equipment such as fans may
be driven by steam turbines instead of electric motors.
CHP can be increased by adding a VHPS level with superheat and an LPS level. The LPS level requires
additional piping to go from the boiler house to the process building. Figure 3 presents the enhanced CHP
system using the Total Site Profiles. These changes to the steam system increases electricity production by
133 % to 108.1 kWh/tp. In this case self-generation of electricity reduce grid draw by 49 %.
 239

400

350

300 VHPS
HPS
250
108.1 kWh/tp
T** [°C]

200
MPS
150
LPS Site Sink
Profile
100 HTHW

50

LTHW
0
0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000
H [MJ/tp]

Figure 3: Combined heat and power system using Total Site Profiles.

Table 1: Specific energy use of major processing units in future generations of milk powder plants excluding
(1.0) and including (2.0) utility systems optimisation opportunities.
Thermal Energy Use Electrical Use
Major
Zone [MJ/tp] [kWh/tp]
Equipment
1.0 2.0 1.0 2.0
Cream pasteurisation 11 11 - -
Milk Separation
Process pumps - - 13.1 13.1
Heat treatment 208 210 9.7 9.7
Heat Treatment
MVR and TVR units - - 93.9 93.9
& Evaporators
Process pumps - - 2.6 2.6
Air heaters 2,610 2,377 - -
Feed heater and pump 131 131 7.8 7.8
Spray Dryer
Process fans - - 46.4 46.4
Product handling 10 10 22.1 22.1
CIP 74 74 - -
HVAC 83 83 7.3 7.3
Chiller unit - - 6.7 8.5
Utility Services Compressed air unit - - 6.8 6.8
Boiler pump and fan - - 3.3 3.2
Thermal losses 537 441 - -
Electricity generation - 530 - 108.1
Excluding CHP 3,663 3,338 219.9 221.6
Totals
Including CHP - 3,868 - 113.4

4. Comparison of energy use for current and future milk powder plant designs
The milk powder plant model has been applied to calculate thermal and electrical energy demand for three
designs: the current plant design, the future process design (Design 1.0), and the future optimised process
and utility design (2.0). Table 1 compares the thermal and electrical energy for the two future designs, broken
down into processing zone and major plant equipment. The figures are presented as specific energy per tonne
of milk powder produced.
240

The future process design, which includes improvements to the heat treatment, evaporator and spray dryer
process, achieves an overall specific fuel reduction of 29.6 %. A key element of the new designs is the
increased use of Mechanical Vapour Recompression technology in the evaporator process. This is the main
driver for electricity use increasing by 4.5 %. The air heaters contributes 55 % of thermal energy demand in
the current process design and 71 % in the future process design. As Table 1 shows, the reduction in process
heat demand has the natural consequence of reducing boiler thermal losses since less steam is required.
Implementing a condensing economiser in the boiler system and upgrading chiller waste heat further reduces
fuel use by 6.3 %, which is an overall reduction of 35.9% compared to the current plant design. CHP uses an
extra 530 MJ/tp of fuel (15.9 % increase compared to the fuel use in design 1.0) to efficiently generate
electricity, which lowers the site’s grid draw. In the 2.0 design, CHP provides 51 % of the total electricity
requirement.

5. Conclusions
Maximum boiler efficiency for milk powder production is achieved by installing a condensing economiser for
the flue gas to indirectly heat fluidised bed air flows through the boiler condensate system. This is best
achieved by matching the hot condensate return flows to heat the fluidised bed air and then returning the cold
condensate to the boiler to be reheated in the condensing economiser prior to deaeration. As a result specific
fuel use decreases by 227 MJ/tp. Chiller waste heat can be integrated as a heat source with a marginal COP
of 13 by expending more electricity to increase the pressure of the condenser. The condenser may replace the
equivalent specific fuel use of 101 MJ/tp through integration with the site low temperature hot water loop. By
designing the steam system to maximise electricity generation in a new turbine, results show that 51 % of the
site’s electricity demand may be satisfied by CHP. The combined effect of implementing these three utility
systems opportunities is a specific fuel use of 3,868 MJ/tp, of which 530 MJ/tp results from electricity
production, and a specific grid electricity demand of 113.4 kWh/tp. Future work will extend the search to
longer-term energy efficiency opportunities in the processing system as well as performing a cost-benefit
analysis. Without CHP, the new specific fuel use is 3,338 MJ/tp, which is a 35.9 % reduction from the current
plant design, and the increased electricity use is 221.6 kWh/tp, which is a 4.5 % increase. Future work will
extend the search to longer-term energy efficiency opportunities in the processing system as well as
performing a detailed cost-benefit analysis.

References
Klemeš J.J. (Ed.), 2013, Handbook of Process Integration: Minimisation of energy and water use, waste and
emissions, Woodhead Publishing, Cambridge, UK.
Manesh M.H.K., Abadi S.K., Ghalami H., Amidpour M., Hamedi M.H., 2012, A New Cogeneration Targeting
Procedure for Total Site, Chemical Engineering Transactions 29, 1561–1566.
Medina-Flores J.M., Picón-Núñez M., 2010, Modelling the power production of single and multiple extraction
steam turbines, Chemical Engineering Science 65, 2811–2820.
Ramírez C.A., Patel M., Blok K., 2006, From fluid milk to milk powder: Energy use and energy efficiency in the
European dairy industry, Energy 31, 1984–2004.
Sun L., Doyle S., Smith R., 2013, Cogeneration improvement based on steam cascade analysis, Chemical
Engineering Transactions 35, 13–18.
Walmsley M.R.W., Walmsley T.G., Matthews L., Atkins M.J., Neale J.R., Kamp P.J.J., 2015a, Pinch analysis
techniques for carbon emissions reduction in the New Zealand industrial process heat sector, Chemical
Engineering Transactions 45, 1087–1092.
Walmsley T.G., Walmsley M.R.W., Atkins M.J., Neale J.R., Tarighaleslami A.H., 2015b, Thermo-economic
optimisation of industrial milk spray dryer exhaust to inlet air heat recovery, Energy 90, Part 1, 95–104.
Walmsley T.G., Walmsley M.R.W., Neale J.R., Atkins M.J., 2016, Appropriate Placement of Vapour
Recompression in Ultra-Low Energy Industrial Milk Evaporation Systems using Pinch Analysis, Energy,
accepted article. DOI:10.1016/j.energy.2016.04.026
Yang M., Feng X., Liu G., 2014, Heat Exchanger Network Design Considering the Heat Pump Performance,
Chemical Engineering Transactions 39, 1099–1104.