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Cold stores and, more commonly,
temperature-controlled zones are
an essential part of the supply
chain in the food and beverage
and pharmaceutical industries. The
products have to be stored, retrieved,
sorted or picked in a temperature-
controlled zone. Without doubt this
is an expensive affair to manage and
so the correct design and equipment
should be considered in order
to provide a safe and productive
operation. At an age where building
and energy costs come at a premium,
cold store plan and design should be
looked at in great depth in order to
keep these high costs to an absolute
minimum.
Furthermore, working in environments
of -20ºC and below can easily hinder
productivity, in which case exposure to
these extreme temperatures by your
staff should be kept to a minimum.
A temperature-controlled zone is no
more than a room enclosed in insulated
panels and operating one or more
freezer units inside the chamber, thus
constantly keeping the environment
at the desired temperature. Access
to this room is achieved by means of
sliding panel doors which can also seal
shut when the chamber is not in use by
operators.
Maintaining these temperatures in
the most cost-effective manner is not
easy. It is common practice in cold
store design to construct a chill room
adjacent to the deep freeze chamber,
which will enable staff to arrange and
prepare orders in a more comfortable
environment and outside of the typical
subzero temperatures. Such rooms are
usually maintained at around +5ºC. It is
important to remember that goods in this
area have only a limited time before they
start to thaw out so order preparation
should be fast and loaded onto the
freezer trucks in a timely fashion.
Staff operating picking duties in deep
freeze environments will not only
be less productive, they will also be
exposed to health hazards. It is more
suitable therefore to have a dedicated
driver in a forklift (preferably with a
heated cabin) that operates in the
deep freeze and feeds pallets to and
from the order preparation area. For
the safety of staff it is advisable to
have underfloor heating as ice
build-up would be common due to
the condensation created from the
temperature differences.
High speed doors for cold stores are
specially designed to operate in
these severe temperatures. With the
traditional 2 door solution, the operator
opens the sliding door at the start of
the shift and then operates the high
speed door throughout the day’s
activities. These special doors are
installed on the cold side and have in
built heaters to avoid the build-up of
ice. The motors and moving parts have
cold resistant oils to stop them from
freezing over.
A new generation door from Efaflex
however can provide a single door
solution combining high speed and
almost hermetic sealing when closing.
With this solution the single door is
installed on the warm side. Many
companies use the freezer’s sliding
freezer door as a means of going in
and out during the daily operations.
While this door may open somewhat
quickly, energy is still wasted as most
of the times the operator will forget
or not be bothered to close the door
behind him. One can imagine how
much air loss this means when done
consistently throughout the day. A high
speed door on the other hand will be
programmed to close automatically
the minute the operator passes
through and hence he can focus on
doing his work instead of having to
remember to close doors.
With an average open time of about
2 seconds followed by automatic
closing this means enormous energy
savings throughout the day. But the
benefits don’t stop there; your products
reach optimal temperature quickly,
temperature fluctuation is minimal
and the compressor units don’t have
to work as hard to maintain constant
temperatures. Multiply this daily
throughout your year and the door
pays for itself very quickly.
A quick guide to
cold store logistics
40
Logistics Business Magazine | November 2015
COLD STORE DOORS