News
Quorn Foods
Quorn Foods is the world’s leader in meat alternatives with a vision to create better protein for people and the planet, addressing global health and sustainability issues.
On 15 November 2018, the world’s biggest meat alternative production facility officially opened at Quorn Foods’ Belasis site in Billingham, in the North East. The factory expansion of 9,500m2 doubled production capacity of Quorn’s core products, adding approximately 20,000 tonnes per annum. It is part of a £150m investment by Quorn Foods, reflecting an increase in flexitarian and vegan diets, and the fact that the UK is the most advanced meat-free market in the world.
The state-of-the-art production facility will produce 1.33M packs of Quorn® products per week, equivalent to the meat produced by 1,600 cows. The efficiency improvements the expansion will deliver will help Quorn Foods continue to reduce its carbon emissions per tonne of food produced, already down by 35% since 2012. The packaging process at Belasis uses large quantities of on-site generated nitrogen gas to displace oxygen and thereby preserve the food. Oxygen is the main agent in the air that causes spoilage by allowing the growth of potentially harmful bacteria. Not only would the bacteria spoil the food, but they could also cause disease and/or death in consumers. By contrast, nitrogen is a nonreactive gas that is non-toxic & non-odorous. The large volumes of expensive, high purity nitrogen are produced for the blanketing process must therefore be accurately metered. When Quorn Foods needed to address this measurement, they contracted ABLE to supply them with Magnetrol’s industry proven Thermatel TA2 Thermal Mass Flow Meter. With its excellent low flow sensitivity, high turndown and direct mass flow measurement, the TA-2 is ideally suited to this critical application.