The Irwindale, California MillerCoors brewery saves water and energy with an improved condensate recovery system

The customer
The Irwindale, California brewery produces seven million barrels of beer annually.

The challenge
To reduce water usage and to save energy with a more efficient condensate recovery system.

Our solution
Spirax Sarco steam experts surveyed the condensate return system and the operation of key system components. It was determined that condensate recovery could be improved by 75-80% and that energy could be saved by eliminating the condensate dump, replacing failed traps, eliminating improperly applied trap types that often plug and fail closed causing increased water usage, and by refitting automatic pump-traps on the heat exchangers.

Results
Spirax Sarco completed all the work in one month without disrupting the production schedule. The system changes resulted in significant improvements in packaging capacity and equipment heat-up time and also achieved the goal of 85% condensate recovery with annual savings of 5.4 million gallons of water and 8% projected energy saving.