FDBusiness.com

It was just 18 months ago that Glanbia Ingredients Ireland awarded GEA a contract to build one of Europe’s largest and most efficient milk processing plants in Belview, Ireland. The first production started in December, 2014: on time, on budget and exactly as planned.

Belview uses the latest dairy technology from GEA to process three million litres of milk a day into more than 100,000 tonnes of dairy powders a year. GEA supplied the complete plant drawing on the company’s full scope of dairy process technologies and components from milk reception through standardization, evaporation and drying to powder transport and packing. Also the complete automation package was supplied by GEA.

Glanbia’s new nutritional ingredients plant builds on the latest in dairy technology, and it is a showcase for the most modern dairy plants in the world. It has been designed to ensure the most efficient operation in terms of overall equipment efficiency, energy and resource consumption while producing products of the highest quality in a safe environment.

Building a plant this size on an 18 month schedule, delivering it on time and budget, requires solid expertise in managing large projects. GEA’s responsibility included the entire project from process design to project delivery. “Projects like this require careful planning and close coordination between our project management teams, headed by a project director, and the customer,” explains Jan Samsson, Project Director with GEA, and responsible for the Belview project. “We structure projects around that with a sponsor group representing the customer, the builder and GEA. It helps get ahead of challenges and thereby reduces risk for all.”