BOGE places all components together in a container. BLUEprotect can be deployed flexibly and in different types of silo.
January 29, 2019: The number of starving people in the world keeps increasing but at the same time large amounts of grains are going to waste after harvesting, on the way to the consumer. It is the poorer regions of the world that are most affected.
Granary weevils, parasitic fungi, mice and rats: a large part of the grain stored worldwide falls victim to pests and so-called breathing losses. Oxygen plays a critical part in this. Lack of oxygen minimises storage losses. To provide better protection from pests for grain stored in silos, leading compressed air specialist BOGE has developed BLUEprotect which is based on this simple principle.
With BLUEprotect, BOGE uses nitrogen from the ambient air. A compressor produces compressed air close to the silo. It reaches a membrane filter via a dryer and combined filter, which separates the nitrogen (N2) from the oxygen (O2) and feeds it into the silo. As a main component of the air we breathe, nitrogen is available in unlimited supplies, and is completely harmless when it comes into contact with foodstuffs. After use, the nitrogen is re-absorbed into the ambient air.
“This makes BLUEprotect an attractive method of pest control where the use of chemical agents is not permitted or desirable – for example, in ecological farming or in the supply chain for breweries. Malting plants, for instance, have to ensure that no chemical residues are left behind in the barley; these could later find their way into the beer with the malt when brewing,” says Nalin Amunugama, General Manager of BOGE Kompressoren Asia Pacific.
The processing is straightforward for the user. BOGE arranges all plant components in a container, so that BLUEprotect can be placed flexibly, without special prior knowledge and in different types of silos. BOGE analyses the starting position with the customer to record the initial nitrogen requirement. An essential precondition is a sufficiently airtight silo.
According to Mr Amunugama, BOGE offers a rental container for a test run if required by the customer, with which the airtightness of the silo can be clearly ascertained after a few days.
