Heating in Food Processing
The following processes in food processing have scope for integrating solar heating:
Solar Drying
Drying is a part of most food processing industries and currently expensive fuels like electricity or diesel are used for drying. Concentrating Solar Thermal (CST) technology can be used in conjunction with the existing drying system to reduce the fuel consumption.
CST systems are versatile and can be integrated with drying systems that use steam or hot water or thermic fluid.
Pressurized Hot Water with Solar
Solar Compound Parabolic Collectors (CPCs) can be used to generate pressurized hot water that can be used for pre-heating Boiler Feed Water (BFW).
Pasteurization uses steam or thermic fluid for generating temperature around 90 Deg C to 150 Deg C using fossil fuel based heating systems. Concentrating Solar Thermal (CST) technologies can be used to provide the heat required for pasteurization process without any change to the process.
Solar Pasteurisation in Milk Industry
Solar Boiler
Parabolic Trough Concentrator (PTC), like the one shown below, can be used to generate temperatures up to 350 deg C and can be used as solar boiler. The heat generated from such solar boiler can be used for various food processing needs.
Heat from the PTC field can be provided to the processes using any of the following steps:
- Use thermic fluid in the PTC field and use hot thermic fluid to generate steam in a heat exchanger.
- Steam can then be given to the process directly or can be integrated into a common steam header.
Since the output from solar field will vary depending on the radiation available, it is critical to design appropriate controls for efficient integration of solar and conventional boiler outputs.
Solar Heat can also be stored in an appropriately sized storage system for extending the usage of heat to non-solar hours.
Solar Sludge Drying
Oorja’s Solar Sludge Drying solution enhances the drying rate of an open pit sludge drying. Reducing the water content from the sludge significantly reduces the associated hauling and disposal costs.
Oorja’s solution integrates its expertise in solar heating, radiant heating and heat pumps to offer a unique solution that can help organisations reduce the drying time of the sludge significantly.
About Oorja Energy Engineering
Oorja Energy Engineering is a complete Cleantech Heating & Cooling solutions company. We offer energy efficient and renewables based products and solutions for industrial and commercial heating and cooling requirements.
Oorja is a Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) approved manufacturer of Concentrating Solar Thermal (CST) systems. We can design & implement cleantech heating and cooling solutions for your specific requirements.