Turns Life, Consumer and Technological Science to a high standard and consistent product
- Factors taken into account in PD: legislation, nutritional composition, quality and safety, desired benefit, consumer acceptability, ability to scale up to factory
- Strict quality guidelines due to a very vulnerable targets audience -> Gatekeepers of quality of products
- Managing full portfolio of products (not only new products) – when one element e.g. legislation changes, full portfolio needs adjusting
- Overseeing the innovation process:
- Co-building with project team
- Mapping of product composition
- Lab trials
- Factory trials
What is the pilot plant
- The pilot plant is a miniature factory. This is where a PD recipe is upscaled from lab to factory. Inside here we have all the equipment in small size which we have in our factories e.g. in Zoetermeer and Liverpool for liquid and Macroom, Wexford, Fulda, Steenvoorde, etc for powder.
- We are standing in front of the wet lines (liquid products). On the other side of the pilot plant is a spray dryer for powders (below the coffee corner).
- The spray dryer has an output of approx. 30 kg an hour while the factory can go up to 14,000 kg an hour.
- Box in back with orange light: Spray box = unique in the world. Is contains a very small spraydryer. It is more than 200 degrees there, so normally we cannot be close to such machine. Via this box we can really see what happens in a spray dryer and learn how our products react.
- The liquid phase development line:
- Adding ingredients -> blending -> homogenisation (processes used to make a mix of two mutually non-soluble liquids the same throughout- particles of similar size and evenly dispersed) -> heat treatment -> packing
- During emulsification we use homogenizers. These homogenizers work with pressures around 600 bars to make very small fat droplets. 600 bars pressure is comparable with pressure at 6000 meter below sea level.
- The pilot plant is not suitable for mass production. Batches start from 5 liter to 200 as that is what fits max in the tank. In a real factory a tank fits 10,000 liters. Standard production in the pilot plant is 6x 20 liter.
- Pilot Plant Fermentation centre: you cannot see it but in our pilot plant we have a specific area dedicated to fermentation process
- What you see is only 1/ 3 of the plant. What you cannot see is that below this floor we save products to see how they behave over time and a sauna to test different climate conditions. We have the opportunity to manipulate our end products with different storage conditions, such as different temperatures, humidity and light. This ensures that our consumers living anywhere in the world can count on the quality of our products. (shelf life testing)
What do we do in the pilot plant
- Three functions:
- Test new recipes from research and product development: nutritional concepts through various processing steps in order to create actual products in large quantities while maintaining the product quality
- Testing new technologies: look for newest technologies and materials that could further improve our production processes
- Step in between the laboratory and a factory: with process technology and pilot testing product brought from small- to full-scale production
- Test new recipes from research and product development: nutritional concepts through various processing steps in order to create actual products in large quantities while maintaining the product quality. This goes for all new products and for product renovations. A renovation may be a new ingredient or different flavor – we test it all in the pilot plant, because the interaction can have effect on the product e.g. the thickness.
- It is important that when we mix ingredients for our products and bring it through our production line, we can detect all added ingredients in the end product. This we do by sending the product back to our Analytical Lab for analysis. The product is not only tested for the presence of all required ingredients but also for functionality in the Life Sciences labs on the 4th floor. Is the product composition according to the proposed label? Product characteristics that are important for the stability, like viscosity, particle size and pH, are analysed after production and during shelf life.
During emulsification we use homogenizers. These homogenizers work with pressures around 600 bars to make very small fat droplets. 600 bars pressure is comparable with pressure at 6000 meter below sea level.