Milk flows through Dairygold’s €33m Mitchelstown plant
It follows a 15-month construction and commissioning programme for the project which will cater for peak production in line with Dairygold’s tightly forecasted expanded milk volumes. The investment increases the processing capacity by an additional 5.2 million litres per week.
It involves the provision of new milk intake bays, a new dairy plant and new evaporation, drying and automated multi bag-off facilities.
The project represents phase one of Dairygold’s post-quota expansion plan.
Phase two will see work begin later this year at the co-op’s brownfield site in Mallow.
New milk-drying facilities to produce the full range of milk powders are to be established at that site.
Enterprise Ireland investment also facilitated the improvement in the energy and environmental performance of the Mitchelstown location.
It boasts one of the country’s largest and most modern anaerobic digester effluent plants, commissioned in 2012.
This waste-to-energy system uses effluent from the site to generate gas to contribute to the site’s energy requirements.
Irish Farmers Association Dairy Committee members were present to see the first milk flow through the new milk drying facilities in Mitchelstown.
Dairygold milk flow is currently showing a 20% increase over April 2013.
The society’s chairman Bertie O’Leary said he is confident the new facility represents the first of many positive and exciting developments in Dairygold over the coming years.
