Location:
Lemoore, California
Customer:
Leprino Foods
Application:
The Lemoore facility planned a large expansion, increasing its cheese-making and whey-processing capacity to a 500,000 sq. ft. facility.
Key Challenges:
Leprino Foods, a global leader in premium-quality cheese manufacturing and the largest U.S. exporter of whey products, was expanding its Lemoore facility. The expansion aimed to make it one of the world’s largest cheese plants. This required additional steam capacity for processing. R.F. MacDonald Co. collaborated with facility engineers to deliver and install a boiler system that could meet the plant’s increased production demands while adhering to the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District’s Ultra-Low NOx requirements.
Solution/Results:
The facility had been using R.F. MacDonald Co.’s service team from Fresno for maintenance, combustion tuning, and emission source testing of its existing boiler equipment. After evaluating various options, Leprino Foods selected R.F. MacDonald Co. to provide and install a new 1200 HP boiler system. This system included a Cleaver-Brooks boiler, a custom control system, burner, economizer, and an Ultra-Low NOx Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR) system.
To maximize energy efficiency and reduce its carbon footprint, Leprino Foods also opted to install a condensing stack economizer and a variable frequency drive for the blower motor. The selected boiler system complies with current regulations and the recently adopted Best Performance Standards (BPS) for boilers exceeding 20 MMBH and 75 psig steam operation. Additionally, the project included modifications to the condensate return system to enhance deaerator performance and maximize condensate recovery, further improving fuel and water efficiency and minimizing environmental impact.
