Background
Mondelez International, a global food company known for its chocolate chip and sandwich cookies, is currently facing a challenge at their North American region due to CO2 shortages. This has caused production losses and potential waste, impacting both the operational/supply chain and the company's sustainability goals.
In response, Mondelez International is committed to reducing their carbon emissions by 50% by 2030 and is actively seeking help from equipment vendors to explore different ideas and strategies to cool flour and dough without relying on CO2. Given that the cost of CO2 consumption is comparable to Natural Gas, finding alternate cooling methods has become crucial.
Challenge
Our challenge is to find a sustainable solution for cooling flour in the manufacturing of biscuits.
The end goal is control final dough temperature to 70F. Controlling dough temperature helps avoid biscuit defects that create baking inefficiencies, impact product appearance (chocolate smearing) and packaging downtime.
Cooling solution must meet the following criteria:
- Removes 40F or more (Initial temp = 100F; Final temp = 60F)
- Capable of cooling 2,000 lbs/hour of flour or more
- Does not use CO2 gas
- Efficient and reliable
- Supports our sustainability goals
- Heat removal can occur in 2 or more steps
Collaborators who can help us find a solution that meets these criteria would not only enable us to reduce our carbon footprint but also improve our production efficiency, reducing costs and potential waste.
What's in it for you?
A successful collaboration could mean, for individuals, becoming part of the wider Mondelez International group, while for organizations, forming a potential partnership with one of the world’s most iconic brands to co-develop and co-launch the idea to market.
These are global challenges and Mondelez International are willing to collaborate with both individuals/freelancers and other industry participants/universities etc. and solutions can be at any stage of development.
If you have or are developing solutions, or if you have expertise in the above, please click "Apply" to submit your solution/expertise to the Network.