All-round and power optimizing!

Francis VOF Noordbeemster (NL); French fried and seed potatoes and other crops

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Together the brothers Willem and Bram Francis run an arable farm of 275 hectares; growing seed potatoes on 56 hectares and processing potatoes on 42 hectare. Combined with onions, sugar beets, wheat, barley and oats, this results in a all-round company.

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In the Noordbeemster polder (northwest of the Netherlands), a new storage and grading area was made in a new buidling of 60 x 60 meters in 2007. Two rooms are provided with the Mooij aspiration system for boxes, each 17,5 x 30 meters long and provided with mechanical cooling. It also houses a third room for bulk storage of onions, approx. 1000 tons and large flat store for 1200 tons of grain.

Referentie_Mooij_Francis A lot of attention is paid to the quality of the building and its technical components. The walls are made with 100 mm PU sandwich panels and the roof is made of 120 mm PU panels. The hatches are even 150 mm thick. At full length of the building (60 m), sliding doors give wide access to the 4 rooms.

Earlier, 3 large rooms had been made for storage of processing potatoes and 2 smaller rooms had been made for seed potatoes. At first, grain was stored in round silos.

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The supply of electrical power is limited. On Mooij's advice Willem and Bram Francis decided to invest in frequency converters for all new rooms. On top of that the control is provided with a power optimizer ("peak shaver") in order not to exceed the maximum level of power consumption.

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With the frequency controller it is possible to reduce the energy consumption with 50% and still obtain 80% of the air volume. "In this way I can dry my onions and at the same time ventilate the grain" as Willem says. The control of the refrigeration system is fully integrated into the ventilation system. This is also the case for the defrost of the evaporators.

The Orion user interface is mounted onto a central position. All 12 rooms can be checked and if necessary adjusted. The Orion is connected to a laptop with the Rainbow management program for overview and registration.