The Association for Decentralised Energy
Home to famous brands including Kelly’s Ice Cream and Fab Lollies, R&R Ice Cream installed two MWM TCG 2020 V20 natural gas engines (pictured below) at their production facility plant based in Northallerton, North Yorkshire as part of their expansion aspirations. Due to the restrictions on the amount of electricity that was available to be imported, R&R Ice Cream decided in early 2012 to consider the installation of a CHP plant to provide greater independence from the national grid supply.
This proactive approach to maintaining profitability in a sustainable manner has since significantly reduced their energy costs, carbon emissions and, as such the energy savings made have been re-invested back into the business.
With a combined electrical output of 4MW, the two MWM TCG 2020 V20 gas engines are configured for both Low Temperature Hot Water (LTHW) and steam generation, and formed part of an innovative on-site development, resulting in the largest CHP installation in a UK ice cream factory.
Working within R&R Ice Cream’s technical requirements, both MWM engines were containerised at Edina’s manufacturing facility based in Lisburn, Northern Ireland. The modular containerised off-site construction of the package units, significantly reduced the on-site construction time, reduced on-site waste and reduced the commissioning process, all resulting in an overall programme improvement.
The initial design was to incorporate the CHP plant within an existing site building, and further examination deemed the building unsuitable from a construction and operation basis.
As such a new Energy Centre was constructed in the place of the previous building. As with the CHP Plant, this Energy Centre was constructed on a modular basis to reduce disruption to site.
The on-going maintenance and control of the energy centre was the key design requirement for the Energy Centre. The CHP could be augmented, or changed to complement changes in energy usage or new technologies as they become available.
Edina’s design team and R&R Ice Cream’s site production staff worked together to review existing site load data, plan an upgrade to the gas connection required for the CHP, and assess the layout and integration with the existing thermal and electrical infrastructure. The efforts and experience of the two teams meant that external consultation was not required for the project.
