Food and beverage manufacturing generates a large amount of waste water. Processing a kilo of meat generates around 1.2 litres of waste water, processing a litre of dairy product generates around 2.5 litres of waste water and incredibly, manufacturing a litre of beverage generates as much as six litres of waste water. The effective management of this waste water is critical to hygiene, employee safety and production continuity. Yet many food and beverage experts look at the drainage only as a product and not the overall process.
The need for high performance, hygienically designed drainage systems and the significant impact they have on food safety is widely accepted by food and beverage manufacturers but the key factors which affect drainage specification are not as well known. At ACO we’re committed to helping companies put hygiene first and when we design a drainage system there are three key criteria that we always consider.
1. What drainage capacity is required and does the drainage layout match the production equipment layout?
All too often not enough consideration is given to the required capacity and flow rate that the drainage needs to handle now, and may potentially need to handle in the future. Insufficient drainage capacity leads to flooding which compromises health and safety in the workplace and increases the risk of cross-contamination. It’s important to ensure the layout of the drainage matches the layout of the production equipment. Put simply, if equipment is placed on top of the drainage or drainage is not easily accessible, the drainage system may not work correctly, may be hard to maintain and impossible, or at least difficult, to clean. It’s important to plan your production equipment layout and your drainage system at the same time, and not in isolation. Both the layout of the factory equipment and the drainage system needs to be considered right at the start of a project.
