IDM ¦ Site report
Mega-dairy in the West
Hochwald's new plant in Mechernich
Hochwald officially commissioned the new large-scale
dairy in Mechernich on 25 June 2022. € 200 million was
invested in the mega-project on a 220,000 m² greenfield
site, and the project kept within budget during its
three-year duration. The result is a plant trimmed for maximum
efficiency and designed exclusively for liquid products - UHT milk,
UHT milk drinks, coffee cream, condensed milk, which are mainly
filled in carton packs in addition to the popular coffee cream jug.
Among the suppliers involved were GEA (milk reception,
complete processing, evaporator, UHT systems), Krones (palletising,
high-bay warehouse, intralogistics incl. an electric overhead
conveyor from GP), Derichs (handling of dry ingredients), Elopak
30 · September/October 2022 ¦ international-dairy.com
(carton filler), Meurer (secondary packaging) and VDB Packaging
(cup filling machine). KSI was responsible for the general planning
and project management of what is currently the largest new dairy
building in Europe.
On the energy side, Hochwald in Mechernich relies on a contracting
solution from GETEC, which operates sustainable energy
generation plants using the latest technologies. The factory's
wastewater is treated in a specially built wastewater treatment
plant, and AWS (Gelsenwasser) was won over for a partnership
as the plant's operator. There is the possibility of an expansion to
1.5 billion kg raw milk throughput on the site.
/international-dairy.com
