Sustainability at the soul of Shoalhaven Starches success

Sustainability at the soul of Shoalhaven Starches success

Located in Nowra, New South Wales, a few kilometres away from the world-class Shoalhaven Starches site, sits the lush green rolling pastures of Manildra Group’s Environmental Farm home to beef cattle and the freshwater pools of the Water Treatment Plant – the soul of sustainability in our zero-waste manufacturing process.

If the past decades have told us anything, it is that investments in sustainable business practices are more important now than ever before.

By adopting a truly global outlook to the core of our business practices, Manildra Group has been at the forefront of sustainability, exceeding industry expectations by pioneering sustainable water practices and further add-value to our operations.

“The health of our natural resources is critical to our future operations, and sustainable practices will ensure we protect our local environment and rural communities in which we operate, resulting in a successful company and better world,” said Manildra Group Managing Director John Honan.

The Honan family purchased the Shoalhaven Starches site in 1970, originally to produce wheat starches for the booming paper and packing industry, located in the industrial hub of Nowra, on the South Coast of New South Wales.

By 1985, production had significantly increased with the site investing in crucial infrastructure to expand their product range and production capacity, with Manildra Group continuing to strive to “extract value from 100 per cent of the Australian wheat grain”.

“The world-class plant is powered by steam and water and is committed to producing the most premium wheat-based products with zero waste. This expansion coupled with sustainable management practices, led us to invest in an advanced Water Treatment Plant that we established at the heart of our Environmental Farm,” said Mr Honan proudly.

Closing-the-loop on our process, water is treated, rigorously purified to comply with Australian Drinking Water Guidelines (ADWG) and reused in the production process, the remaining water is filtered to our irrigation programs on farm to support our beef cattle herd.

Manildra Group Water Treatment Specialist, Igor Ciugureanu, explains that water is fundamental to Shoalhaven Starches’ highly integrated manufacturing process, with a reliable consistent water supply vital to power the site.

“Water is needed throughout the entire production process, this is critical to operate this site day-in and day-out, 365 days a year, producing food and industrial products for local businesses and some of the world’s most recognisable brands.

“Water is an essential natural resource that we need to preserve. We reduce and reuse as much as possible to minimise wastewater at the end of the production process.

“This notion is critical to the success, growth and ultimately sustainability of the business.

“And Manildra Group has perfected this – reducing our water footprint, reinvesting in the world’s best water technology and facilities, developing exceptional water treatment processes to ensure water is treated and re-used either through the Shoalhaven Starches production process or irrigation systems on farm,” he told The Cultivator.

Manildra Group’s research and development teams, drives an innovative science and technology agenda in order to meet our ambition to maintain a zero-waste process.

“When water cannot be reused, either in the manufacturing process or for external factory purposes, it must be extensively treated before being returned to the environment.

“Water is purified through a process of anaerobic and aerobic digestion, prior to being  returned to the plant for everyday production processes and additionally, our irrigation systems here at our Environmental Farm.

“Our Biodigester is completely sealed from the atmosphere to allow anaerobic (low oxygen) conditions to prevail meticulously. Inside, micro-organisms that thrive in these conditions digest the bulk of the organic compounds present in the water after the wheat production process,” said Mr Ciugureanu.

Manildra Group’s anaerobic digestion’s micro- organisms produce Biogas (methane) that is captured under airtight seals and securely piped back to the Shoalhaven Starches site as “clean fuel” for the boilers, which produce steam to power the site.

“The water remains in the Biodigester for up to ten days before being released for further treatment. Our water treatment processes, and infrastructure is the envy of the world, with the best technology integral in reaching our sustainability commitments,” said Mr Ciugureanu.

The second treatment phase supplies oxygen to a different range of micro-organisms.

Here, in these aerobic (oxygenated) conditions, the remaining organic compounds from the anaerobic treatment are digested completely.

Importantly, the majority of the water is critically returned to the Shoalhaven Starches site for re-processing, after passing a further rigorous purification step.

80 per cent of the wastewater sent to the Environmental Farm is purified to Drinking Water quality and returned back to site. With further projects due to be completed soon, we expect to continue increasing our water recovery percentage.

“This final stage of water purification, by Ultrafiltration and Reverse Osmosis, filters the water to Australian Drinking Water Guidelines (ADWG),” said Mr Ciugureanu.

“A stringent, methodical and highly-technical process pushes the treated water through the semipermeable membranes where only the water can pass through and impurities are removed,” he said.

Once it has met these rigorous standards, the water is securely returned to holding tanks, to be utilised in our Shoalhaven Starches production process – “a fully circular economy”.

Part of our integrated ‘farm-gate-to-plate’ approach, the treated water is utilised to irrigate crops rotating with the seasons including maize in summer and ryegrass pasture through winter and spring, value-adding to our beef cattle operations managed by Manildra Group Environmental Farm Manager Greg Smith.

Established in 1988, our Environmental Farm comprises of more than 1,000 hectares of pastural land used for fodder crops, pasture, and cattle grazing.

“We grow corn chop and grass silage to feed our 1,500 head (and sell any excess to local dairy farmers), with our mostly-black Angus cattle getting a nutritious healthy feed mix including Manildra Stockfeed dried distillers grain (DDG-S) wheat pellets and syrup.”

With approximately 400 breeders and 700 backgrounding steers, the Angus cattle are sold to a major Australian retailer, and “phenomenally we’re producing premium top-quality sustainable delicious beef,” said Mr Smith.

Mr Smith said the average daily weight gain increased from 1.6kg to incredibly 1.8kg with the successful daily diet integration of pellets which delivered quality, growth, wellbeing, health, and palatability, coupled with fresh pasture.

With our staunch commitment to upholding sustainability and value-adding innovation, Manildra Group Shoalhaven Starches Quality Assurance and Environmental Coordinator John Studdert said that this year the company was thrilled to be celebrating a 70-year history in the heart of rural Australia.

In conjunction with the Environmental Farm irrigation programs, energy is generated on site using recycled water in our state-of-the-art Mechanical Vapour Recompression (MVR) evaporator which supplements the capacity

of the advanced water treatment plant on site which already recycles more than six million litres of water per day, and substantially enhances water efficiencies.

“The MVR evaporator’s high-pressure centrifugal fan generates vapour from the product stream to be condensed as recycled water, which is further used in a fully integrated manufacturing process,” said Mr Studdert.

“We have been uncompromising in our commitment to reduce, reuse and recycle water throughout our process, ensuring we exceed water conservation targets, biodiversity protection and increasing water efficiencies.

“Our team has such a sense of pride, continually evaluating our advanced manufacturing processes – always striving to do better for our people, our rural communities, and the environment,” said Mr Studdert.

Located in Nowra, New South Wales, a few kilometres away from the world-class Shoalhaven Starches site, sits the lush green

rolling pastures of Manildra Group’s Environmental Farm home to beef cattle and the freshwater pools of the Water Treatment Plant – the soul of sustainability in our zero-waste manufacturing process.

If the past decades have told us anything, it is that investments in sustainable business practices are more important now than ever before.

By adopting a truly global outlook to the core of our business practices, Manildra Group has been at the forefront of sustainability, exceeding industry expectations by pioneering sustainable water practices and further add-value to our operations.

“The health of our natural resources is critical to our future operations, and sustainable practices will ensure we protect our local environment and rural communities in which we operate, resulting in a successful company and better world,” said Manildra Group Managing Director John Honan.

The Honan family purchased the Shoalhaven Starches site in 1970, originally to produce wheat starches for the booming paper and packing industry, located in the industrial hub of Nowra, on the South Coast of New South Wales.

By 1985, production had significantly increased with the site investing in crucial infrastructure to expand their product range and production capacity, with Manildra Group continuing to strive to “extract value from 100 per cent of the Australian wheat grain”.

“The world-class plant is powered by steam and water and is committed to producing the most premium wheat-based products with zero waste. This expansion coupled with sustainable management practices, led us to invest in an advanced Water Treatment Plant that we established at the heart of our Environmental Farm,” said Mr Honan proudly.

Closing-the-loop on our process, water is treated, rigorously purified to comply with Australian Drinking Water Guidelines (ADWG) and reused in the production process, the remaining water is filtered to our irrigation programs on farm to support our beef cattle herd.

Manildra Group Water Treatment Specialist, Igor Ciugureanu, explains that water is fundamental to Shoalhaven Starches’ highly integrated manufacturing process, with a reliable consistent water supply vital to power the site.

“Water is needed throughout the entire production process, this is critical to operate this site day-in and day-out, 365 days a year, producing food and industrial products for local businesses and some of the world’s most recognisable brands.

“Water is an essential natural resource that we need to preserve. We reduce and reuse as much as possible to minimise wastewater at the end of the production process.

“This notion is critical to the success, growth and ultimately sustainability of the business.

“And Manildra Group has perfected this – reducing our water footprint, reinvesting in the world’s best water technology and facilities, developing exceptional water treatment processes to ensure water is treated and re-used either through the Shoalhaven Starches production process or irrigation systems on farm,” he told The Cultivator.

Manildra Group’s research and development teams, drives an innovative science and technology agenda in order to meet our ambition to maintain a zero-waste process.

“When water cannot be reused, either in the manufacturing process or for external factory purposes, it must be extensively treated before being returned to the environment.

“Water is purified through a process of anaerobic and aerobic digestion, prior to being  returned to the plant for everyday production processes and additionally, our irrigation systems here at our Environmental Farm.

“Our Biodigester is completely sealed from the atmosphere to allow anaerobic (low oxygen) conditions to prevail meticulously. Inside, micro-organisms that thrive in these conditions digest the bulk of the organic compounds present in the water after the wheat production process,” said Mr Ciugureanu.

Manildra Group’s anaerobic digestion’s micro- organisms produce Biogas (methane) that is captured under airtight seals and securely piped back to the Shoalhaven Starches site as “clean fuel” for the boilers, which produce steam to power the site.

“The water remains in the Biodigester for up to ten days before being released for further treatment. Our water treatment processes, and infrastructure is the envy of the world, with the best technology integral in reaching our sustainability commitments,” said Mr Ciugureanu.

The second treatment phase supplies oxygen to a different range of micro-organisms.

Here, in these aerobic (oxygenated) conditions, the remaining organic compounds from the anaerobic treatment are digested completely.

Importantly, the majority of the water is critically returned to the Shoalhaven Starches site for re-processing, after passing a further rigorous purification step.

80 per cent of the wastewater sent to the Environmental Farm is purified to Drinking Water quality and returned back to site. With further projects due to be completed soon, we expect to continue increasing our water recovery percentage.

“This final stage of water purification, by Ultrafiltration and Reverse Osmosis, filters the water to Australian Drinking Water Guidelines (ADWG),” said Mr Ciugureanu.

“A stringent, methodical and highly-technical process pushes the treated water through the semipermeable membranes where only the water can pass through and impurities are removed,” he said.

Once it has met these rigorous standards, the water is securely returned to holding tanks, to be utilised in our Shoalhaven Starches production process – “a fully circular economy”.

Part of our integrated ‘farm-gate-to-plate’ approach, the treated water is utilised to irrigate crops rotating with the seasons including maize in summer and ryegrass pasture through winter and spring, value-adding to our beef cattle operations managed by Manildra Group Environmental Farm Manager Greg Smith.

Established in 1988, our Environmental Farm comprises of more than 1,000 hectares of pastural land used for fodder crops, pasture, and cattle grazing.

“We grow corn chop and grass silage to feed our 1,500 head (and sell any excess to local dairy farmers), with our mostly-black Angus cattle getting a nutritious healthy feed mix including Manildra Stockfeed dried distillers grain (DDG-S) wheat pellets and syrup.”

With approximately 400 breeders and 700 backgrounding steers, the Angus cattle are sold to a major Australian retailer, and “phenomenally we’re producing premium top-quality sustainable delicious beef,” said Mr Smith.

Mr Smith said the average daily weight gain increased from 1.6kg to incredibly 1.8kg with the successful daily diet integration of pellets which delivered quality, growth, wellbeing, health, and palatability, coupled with fresh pasture.

With our staunch commitment to upholding sustainability and value-adding innovation, Manildra Group Shoalhaven Starches Quality Assurance and Environmental Coordinator John Studdert said that this year the company was thrilled to be celebrating a 70-year history in the heart of rural Australia.

In conjunction with the Environmental Farm irrigation programs, energy is generated on site using recycled water in our state-of-the-art Mechanical Vapour Recompression (MVR) evaporator which supplements the capacity of the advanced water treatment plant on site which already recycles more than six million litres of water per day, and substantially enhances water efficiencies.

“The MVR evaporator’s high-pressure centrifugal fan generates vapour from the product stream to be condensed as recycled water, which is further used in a fully integrated manufacturing process,” said Mr Studdert.

“We have been uncompromising in our commitment to reduce, reuse and recycle water throughout our process, ensuring we exceed water conservation targets, biodiversity protection and increasing water efficiencies.

“Our team has such a sense of pride, continually evaluating our advanced manufacturing processes – always striving to do better for our people, our rural communities, and the environment,” said Mr Studdert.