Food Quality Magazine
ISSUE 01 | JANUARY 2016
Carriere & Sons owns and operates
hundreds of acres of walnut trees,
in addition to their walnut drying
facility. They are also in partnership
with Borges of California, which is
owned by Borges of Spain. Borges is
the world’s leading walnut operator
and has forty-eight companies in its
group devoted to the production and
marketing of oils, dried fruits and
nuts. Walnuts are dried at a relatively low temperature with a minimum
temperature of 110°F (43°C) leaving
the dryer. This low temperature
requirement is ideally suited for the
use of solar air heating technology.
duct packaging and marketing materials that promote the product that
has been dried in the facility using a
certified solar air collector.
AiR Solar Raised
AiR Solar Raised would be used by
farms and companies that raise animals such as chickens and turkeys in
solar heated barns using a certified
solar air collector.
The logo may only be used on product packaging and marketing materials that promote animals which
have been raised in the facility with
the solar heating system.
As countries around the world embrace the principals of organic agriculture and sustainable production,
they are also looking at how their
food is processed and if it is safe and
eco-friendly. Consumers are ascribing greater importance to the use
of clean energy throughout the entire lifecycle of the product, generating more demand for clean energy
products for the food industry.
Examples in Food Industry
Carriere & Sons; Walnut Drying California
A normal drying season consists of
two months of drying from September 1st to October 31st. The walnuts
are dried from 35% moisture content
to 10% moisture content.
The SolarWall air heating system was
installed on the roof of a drying building at Carriere. The 3,200 ft2 (300
m2) solar system spans the entire
roof area and will displace around
308 million BTU of natural gas for the
two month drying season. The system heats approximately 25,000 cfm
of air, which is then ducted into the
70,000 cfm blower.
Picture 1 - Carriere & Sons; Walnut Drying California
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