The Economic Impact of a New Type of Ripening Chamber in Traditional Cheese Manufacturing

Abstract

A new prototype of a ripening chamber was proposed in the CFD4CHEESE project aiming to evaluate the application of computational fluid dynamics in the optimization of traditional cheeses ripening conditions. With the purpose of evaluating the possible impact on the energy cost of cheese ripening in three Portuguese regions (Setúbal, Évora, and Beja), we demonstrated the potential economic benefits of the prototype. The proposed automation process would imply higher productive efficiency, reducing the consumption of water and electricity. The simple consideration of the reduction of electricity costs is enough to recover the investment needed to have the new ripening chambers, meaning that the investment is economically viable. In addition to the economic impact in firms, which are mostly small and medium firms, our results also contribute to an increase on the sustainable use of natural resources.

IoT and Raspberry Pi application in the food industry: a systematic review

“…Alonso et al, (2020) and Mededjel et al, (2017) indicate that with the use of those technologies of industry 4.0, the companies will be able to act in a quick and efficient way in the problem resolution and with negotiations of act plans, in addition to promove the traceability of the process. Other observation pointed in the studies was the financial gains, occurred due to the reduction of water and energy consumption, influenced by the productive efficiency (Teixeira et al 2020), food security, monitoring the whole process (Gupta & Rakesh, 2018;Jagtap et al, 2021;Jain et al, 2020;Paladino et al, 2019) and transparency in the alimentary chain (Baralla et al, 2020;Pal & Kant, 2020). It has been noticed the application of those approached technologies presented the viability of application in the food industry, however there are some limitations, such as high cost of development, implementation and hardness in finding companies which provide services to the industries.…”

“…(Pal & Kant, 2020) Sensors for detecting the presence of cheese, inlet temperature and humidity, outlet air temperature and speed were used in order to monitor the cheese ripening process. (Teixeira et al 2020) The study used sensors of pH, temperature, conductivity, pressure, humidity, dissolved oxygen and dissolved carbon dioxide, all at low cost.…”

“…(Pal & Kant, 2020) Greater productive efficiency and reduced water and electricity consumption. (Teixeira et al, 2020) Optimization and analysis of process conditions, product quality through data post-processing, indicating possible contamination, and tracking. (Paladino et al, 2019) Application for personal or business purposes, allowing greater safety in food, so that consumption of poor quality is avoided.…”

“…On the other hand Alonso et al (2020) highlight that the main challenges founded was the high values of investment and also the technological availability, as well as the way of utilization which requires previous knowledge for handling the set (Hardware and Software), besides the difficulty for finding companies that render this type of service. Teixeira et al (2020) aim that the study was conducted in a low sampling, being necessary a high scale application for the comprovation of its viability, in addition to assess the impact in the physicochemical, microbiological and sensorial sheep cheese properties matured in the prototipe. Other point indicated as a challenge by the author is to compare this study with the chambers of default maturation, to homogeneous the environmental condition and of business competitive.…”

“…Teixeira et al (2020) implemented a maturation chamber used in traditional cheese fabrication. The chamber holds temperature control, humidity and gas composition, those parameters affect the microbial activity and product organoleptic characteristics.…”