Oxfordshire-based food hygiene technology company Ozo Innovations announced today that it is to receive £600,000 in project funding from the UK Government’s Department of Business Energy Industrial Strategy (BEIS) Industrial Energy Efficiency Accelerator (IEEA) Programme.
The IEEA, managed by The Carbon Trust and Jacobs, is designed to support partnerships between developers of innovative energy efficient technologies and industrial companies willing to test technologies on-site. The Programme’s aim is to lower costs and increase the availability of energy efficient technologies for a wide range of sectors, helping to reduce CO² emissions and improve competitive in UK industry.
The funding will help Ozo verify the energy savings that could be achieved with their innovative eloclear® process.
Ozo Innovations
Source: PRNewsfoto/Ozo Innovations
The aim of the Ozo project is to remove hot water from food factory hygiene process and reduce the total volume of water used overall, with the aim of achieving sound high-quality hygiene outcomes.
The use of hot water for hygiene within the food industry is an energy intensive process. Nonetheless, it is rarely accounted for as a hygiene cost given that utilities spend is usually managed separately from labour, hygiene chemicals and testing costs.
The Ozo eloclear process involves transforming water and food grade salt into powerful disinfectants using electrolysis. The industry standard hot water is then substituted for this cold electrolysed water, the production of which is significantly more energy efficient. The use of cold water in hygiene provides more benefits to food processors operating in chilled environments, due to the reduction in condensation and lessening of the energy costs involved with re-cooling chilled spaces after hot water cleaning. Ozo has been working with many UK food companies, optimising the technology and helping businesses become more competitive and sustainable.
The demonstration project that the IEEA funding pertains to will compare eloclear’s energy saving to the current industry standard of hot water based, chemical cleaning, across various standard hygiene procedures. The results are expected to be published around Summer 2020.
"Consumers are recognising that their food choices are putting the planet under pressure. We use 70% of our fresh water for food production. Hygiene is an area, which offers an opportunity to save energy and water whilst maintaining or improving standards. This is good for everyone, as better hygiene means we can achieve longer shelf life, reduce food waste and maintain the safety of our food," said Rowan Gardner, Ozo Innovations CEO. "We are delighted to have the support of Carbon Trust and Jacobs to demonstrate the energy credentials of eloclear."
Paul Huggins, Director Innovation, the Carbon Trust, who are co-managing the project, said: "This exciting technology could have a major impact throughout the food industry, radically simplifying the way the sector carry out their hygiene processes. We are looking forward to working with Ozo, and scrutinising both the technical performance and energy saving credentials of the technology."
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