Robert Wiseman Dairies Increases Water Savings
A £100 million fresh milk dairy at Bridgwater, Somerset in England has succeeded in increasing its use of recycled water by 50% to over 300,000 litres of water every day, equivalent to the daily water use of 663 households. Known as ‘Britain’s green and white dairy’ Robert Wiseman Dairies Bridgwater facility has set the standard for environmental performance since it opened in 2009 and was the first dairy in the UK to have its own reverse osmosis (RO) plant to ensure that water leaving its on-site effluent treatment plant could be recycled and reused in the dairy.
Recycled water is returned to the mains water tank to be used across the dairy for everything from cleaning the filling lines to pasteurising the milk and significantly reduces the requirement to draw water from the local water supplies.
The RO technology was first introduced in early 2011 initially allowing around 200,000 litres of water leaving Bridgwater’s on-site effluent treatment plant to be recycled and reused. This installation has been expanded and is now providing over 35% of the water required by the dairy which has an annual production of around 500 million litres.
“Water scarcity, particularly in the south of country is a significant issue and our Bridgwater dairy has amongst the best water per litre of milk produced ratios of any dairy in the country,” says Billy Keane, managing director of Robert Wiseman Dairies. “This water recycling is another step towards meeting the target we set of reducing water use across our network of dairies by 25% by 2015 whilst also helping to further reinforce Bridgwater’s reputation as the world’s most environmentally advanced fresh milk dairy.”
Headquartered in East Kilbride near Glasgow in Scotlant, Robert Wiseman Dairies procures, processes and distributes almost a third of all fresh milk consumed inBritain, every day. The company has six dairies and a distribution network which enables the company to deliver milk to customers in every GB postcode. Wiseman is a wholly owned subsidiary of Muller Dairy (UK) and employs around 5,000 people.
