Description du projet
Contrôle intelligent en ligne de l’huile d’olive
Le grade de l’huile d’olive est basé sur les résultats d’examens chimiques et organoleptiques, et le processus est réglementé par la Commission européenne et le Conseil oléicole international. La meilleure qualité est obtenue lorsque l’extraction consiste uniquement en des actions mécaniques sans aucun recours à des solvants chimiques pendant le processus de séparation. Cependant, les solutions actuelles garantissant la meilleure efficacité globale du processus d’extraction et la meilleure qualité de l’huile d’olive fonctionnent hors ligne, prennent énormément de temps et sont coûteuses. Dans ce contexte, le projet Almazara 4.0 financé par l’UE, développera une solution de surveillance en ligne intelligente et contrôlée à distance, capable de produire des ajustements rapides des différentes étapes de production. L’objectif global est de donner aux responsables de la production suffisamment de temps pour apporter des modifications au processus, garantissant ainsi des résultats optimaux.
Objectif
Olive oil’s nutritional and healthy qualities have positioned it as one of the fastest growing segments of the global food industry and its quality is regulated by EC and the International Olive Council based on different chemical and organoleptic markers. Thus in order to obtain the best quality during the extraction process, only mechanical actions are applied with no use of chemical solvents during the separation process, reducing the yield of the process which lowers significantly the margins for producers. Current solutions for ensuring highest overall extraction process efficiency and oil quality are off-line, time consuming and costly. Thus, there is a strong need for an in-line monitoring solution capable to produce rapid adjustments of the different production steps. Near infrared (NIR) spectroscopy has emerged as a rapid and non- invasive tool for such purposes. Nevertheless, commercialized NIR technologies fail to integrate a control solution of the extraction process efficiency.
Almazara 4.0 is the first smart NIR system able to improve the efficiency of the extraction process by 35% in average, saving around €60k/olive mill per campaign. We have demonstrated through laboratory tests that our intelligent sensor can regulate the operation of the centrifuge decanter to achieve the maximum extraction of olive oil, while monitoring in-line the olive oil quality (free acidity and oxidation state) and its healthy organoleptic markers (phenolic content). This will save the mill’s operators considerable time and money while providing them valuable information about quality and healthy content in their olive oil production at any given time. In this regard, we deliver a ground-breaking product supporting “resource-efficient and cost-effective solutions to secure sufficient supplies of safe, healthy and high quality food” towards meeting “Sustainable and competitive agri-food sector for a safe and healthy diet” societal challenge addressed by Horizon 2020.
Champ scientifique
- natural sciencescomputer and information sciencessoftware
- natural scienceschemical scienceselectrochemistryelectrolysis
- medical and health scienceshealth sciencesnutrition
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringsensors
- natural sciencesphysical sciencesopticsspectroscopy
Programme(s)
Régime de financement
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1Coordinateur
23000 JAEN
Espagne
L’entreprise s’est définie comme une PME (petite et moyenne entreprise) au moment de la signature de la convention de subvention.