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Keynote presentation at conference of Refrigerated Warehouse & Transport Association of Australia (RWTA), Melbourne, Australia. October 2004.

COLD STORAGE INDUSTRY IN INDIA

by Krishna V. Jog Head, Technology Cell, Kirloskar Pneumatic Co.Ltd, Pune-411013, India. e-mail: kvjog@vsnl.net, jogkv@pnq.kpcl.co.in
Abstract
India is relatively a large country of more than 4 million sqkm of land with a very large number of people with diversified religions, castes, colour, art, history, culture, languages and has a strength in excess of 1 billion (100 crores) as per the last census. India accounts for nearly 17% of the world population. We are the second largest in population in the world, second only to China. It is estimated that it would grow upto 1.5 billion (150 crores) by the year 2040 and may become no.1 surpassing China. Because of the large number of people, the resources for decent survival were not enough and the country was not developed enough to look for artificial methods of preservation. Enough food was not available and the available food was not reaching all the people when it was required. Slowly the production went up, but the required infrastructure was not there in place. Over a period of last 10-15 years the roads are getting developed, the railways have a very wide network, electricity and water is being made available and the thoughts of food preservation have caught up. A large number of cold storages have come up with heavy subsidies, loans and help from the cooperatives and the Government. The old ones have been revamped, generators added to take care of power cuts and the availability of foods by storages / cold storages / CA and MA storages are on the increase. Reliable Refrigeration machinery and plants are indigenously manufactured and expertise developed which is also playing a leading role in the export of fruits / vegetables / meat / flowers etc. as well.

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1.0

Introduction

India is a big country with more than 29 states and 6 union territories. It has several languages and several diversified cultures. It has unity in diversity of races and religions. Few have lost their original identity and many have found a permanent place in the worlds largest democracy.

Map of India (Fig.1) will briefly show its neighbours with Arabian sea on the west, Bay of Bengal on the East and Indian Ocean on the South. The country has one of the largest railway networks in the world (Fig.2). The Indian Railways provide the principal mode of transportation for freight and passengers in the country.

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2.0 GQ Project India has one of the largest Road Networks in the world aggregating to more than 3.5 million km. National Highways Development Project (NHDP), the largest infrastructure development project undertaken in Independent India, envisages development of 14000 km of world class 4/6 lane Highways connecting all corners of the country. The project known as GQ- Golden Quadrilateral is shown in Fig. 3. The GQ Project comprising Delhi-Kolkata -Chennai -Mumbai Delhi circuit of 5846 km length is almost complete.

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North-South and East-West corridors involving a distance of 7300 km connecting Kashmir with Kanyakumari (Cape Comorin) and Silchar with Porbandar is expected to be complete by 2007- two years ahead of schedule - A thing never heard in India before. Ten major ports are getting connected by NHDP by 4 lane Roads. Building Highways - Accelerating the pace in a big way. 4/6 lane National Highways built between 1947 - 1997 only 556 km i.e. just 11.12 km per year. Now it is about 11 km / day.

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India also has the largest merchant shipping fleet among developing countries. With the development of Railways, Roads and merchant shipping fleet, the movement of fruits, vegetables and other products will improve tremendously. Farmers at various nooks and corners of the country will be able to move their produce very quickly in an economical manner. This will facilitate them to be transported in fresh state, suitable for quick processing / grading / packing etc. in the cold storage environments of proper temperature, humidity and / or proper controlled atmosphere (CA Storage). 3.0 India - An Agricultural Country Agriculture is the major industry of India and about 70% of Indian Population is engaged in activities connected to agriculture. The total agricultural output amounts to approx. 40% of the National Income. The country is producing in excess of 60 million tons of fruits and vegetables per annum. Most of the agricultural produce is perishable in nature and requires certain levels of temperature and humidity to hold the horticultural produce in good condition for longer periods. It is estimated that due to lack of proper facilities of transportation and storage, about 33% of produce, especially fruits and vegetables are wasted i.e. about 20 million tons or 200 lakh tons are wasted. During the peak harvesting season, excess produce gets over flooded and many -a-times, due to lack of storage facilities let alone cold storage facilities- gets damaged and totally wasted, whereas an artificial scarcity gets developed during non-harvesting periods and prices soar and many times, we have to import these goods at exhorbitantly high prices which most of the people of India cannot afford and have to starve. The major important fruits and vegetables grown in India are: Fruits - Apples, Mangoes, Grapes, Oranges, Bananas, Papaya, Pomegranate, Litchi, etc. Vegetables - Potato, Onion, Tomato, Cabbage, Cauliflower. Peas, Okra (Ladies Finger), Garlic, Ginger, Brinjal (Egg Plant), Green Chilies etc. Other important Dry Fruits, Fruit Juices, Chemicals, Dairy Products, Ice Creams, Food items are Frozen meat, Sea foods like Shrimps, fish etc and eggs.

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4.0 Refrigeration Market Size The total Refrigeration Market size is as shown below:

Market size of all cold storages is about 1250 million Ind. Rs. in 2003-2004 (which is about US$ 28 m ) . Out of this the smaller capacity storages at Hotels, Restaurants, airports, etc. account for about 2/3rds and 1/3rd for large cold storages ranging from 1000 tons to 10,000 tons of product (See Annexure-I). 4.1 Large Cold Storages Almost 95 to 98% of these use R-717 (NH3) as refrigerant. Most of these use gravity feed flooded systems or pump-circulation methods. Only very large capacity ones with liquid pump circulation think of screw compressors. Majority of others go in for open type Reciprocating Kirloskar make KC compressors of single stage or two stage design depending on the evaporating temperatures required. A very large proportion of these cold storages use only Kirloskar compressors although there are a small number of other indigenous manufacturers who also manufacture recip compressors. Virtually, Kirloskar KC Compressors are used not only in India but also in many other countries such as Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, the Middle East and even in Australia. We are the largest manufacturers of open reciprocating compressors in India. The smaller capacity cold storages who use halocarbons as refrigerants mostly use R22 or in some very few cases, for imported units use HFCs like R-404a India is the second largest producer of fruits and vegetables in the world. Although for Onions and Mangoes it is the largest in the world. We will now consider some of the main products for which there are a large number of cold storages. Even these are not enough considering the annual production. Steps are being taken to increase the number of storages and also do the upgradation of old storages with old technologies with better engineering and retrofits of modern equipment.

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4.2 Potatoes These are predominantly produced in various states as shown in Fig 4.

The production of Potatoes varied between 200 lakh tons to 250 lakh Tons p.a. from the year 1992-93 to 1997-98. It may go upto about 300 lakh Tons (1 Lakh = 0.1 m or 10 L = 1 m). The total cold store capacity in the country was for about 103 lakh tons numbering 3443. Out of these about 2012 are for potatoes, 447 for multipurpose and 198 for fruits and vegetables and others for miscellaneous items.

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The commodity wise distribution of cold storages is as shown in fig.5

Considering the total cold storage capacity available and the increased production due to increase in productivity etc., there is still a wide gap between production and cold storage capacity. This results in severe losses to farmers due to inadequate storage capacity. Steps are being taken to improve the infrastructure as well as to build additional cold storage capacity by giving subsidies and tax concessions.

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4.3 Onions India is the largest producer of onions in the world. Onion is an important vegetable crop. It is available in plenty during the season and is very cheap and within reach of poorest of the poor. It is grown mainly in the states of Maharashtra, Bihar, Karnataka, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Orissa and Madhya Pradesh as shown in Fig. 6.

The size of the Onion crop in a year depends upon weather conditions. It has been in the range of 40 to 60 lakh tons about 5 years ago and is now expected to be about 70 lakhs tons due to increased productivity. In some years of excessive rains / scanty rains / delayed rains the crop gets affected and results in low production or sometimes

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even after good production, because of lack of storage facilities it gets spoilt and then prices shoot up beyond the reach of the common consumers. The 1997-98 year showed an unprecedented hike and onions had to be imported from various countries at a very high price. Hail storm and sudden drop in soil temperature affected the root activity and bulb formation and hence acute shortage of the product. Traditionally, onions are stored by conventional methods in various parts of the country. These include hanging bunches along with top, storage in various types of godowns. Some of these are provided with ventilation from side and bottom, so that heat generated is not accumulated in the godown. The losses in weight due to shrinkage varies from 10% to 35% due to drying, 10 to 12% by decay and 8 to 12% by sprouting depending upon RH and temperature during the rainy season. The total loss varies from 30% to as high as 56% depending on the type of storage construction used. Refrigerated cold storages for onions are almost non-existent, but efforts in that direction are being seriously now given. The BARC (Bhabha Atomic Research Centre) Bombay has developed techniques of irradiation of Onions and Potatoes by which the storage life can be extended comparatively at higher temperatures even without refrigeration. This has however not yet been used on a commercial scale. 4.4 Mangoes Mango is the National Fruit of India. India is the largest producer of mangoes in the world with more than 12 million tonnes of production per annum. There are a number of various varieties-easily exceeding a thousand but the highest rated of them is the popular Alphanso from Ratnagiri in Maharashtra the birth place of the author of this paper. The share of exports is less than 0.6 % of the global trade. The scene, however, is changing for the better. There is a growing realization about Indias advantage as a Mango producing country and an increasing urge to use these advantages of high Quality, tastes and varities, to capture the global markets. It accounts for more than 50% of world production. 4.5 Apples, Grapes, Oranges etc. India is a major producer of these as well. There is a growing need to develop a complete cold chain right from harvesting to exporting of these products. A large number of pre-cooling units with required temperature and high humidity are already in use for grapes. They reduce the shrinkage and weight loss to a mere 1% or less. 4.5.1 Cold Chains These have already been established for flowers, meat, Ice Cream and a host of other products. Cold storages with prefab panels have been installed at major airports in the country. Container Corporation of India Ltd. (CONCOR) is setting up a countrywide

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network of cold chain complexes to meet the requirements of quality fruits and vegetables in the International and Domestic markets. It proposes to set up 14 such complexes in different parts of the country. In the first phase, three such complexes are coming up - one near Delhi, Bombay and Bangalore. The CONCORs systems involve providing transportation of perishable products from source to the end-user while maintaining the required temperatures all along the route. 4.6 Sea Food Fish, shrimp and many other varities of seafood is caught in abundance along the western coast and eastern coast totaling 7600-km as shown in the map.

Fig, 7 - Coastal areas.

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There are a number of seafoods processing units both for raw and pre-cooked near the shores on land. The sea food is cleaned, graded, packed, blast frozen or frozen in plate freezers and stored in frozen storages and used domestically or exported. 5.0 Refrigeration Systems and Equipment We have so far discussed various fruits, vegetables, sea foods and other products which are to be preserved in cold storages or frozen storages so that they can be made available year-round and there is no scarcity of these at any time of the year thus relieving us from the dependence of a particular season. We will now look into the refrigeration system and equipment used to achieve these desired temperatures and relative humidities. As discussed, today the most common method of achieving these temperatures is by using vapour compression systems. We have seen earlier that small cold storages are generally using halocarbons mainly R-22 or sometimes R-134a or R-404a. The large cold storages use Industrial systems with NH3 (R-717) as the refrigerant. Almost 90% of these large systems use reciprocating compressors. Only the very large ones use screw compressors with liquid ammonia pumping systems. Kirloskar is the accredited packager of Howden (UK) compressors in India. We regularly use Howden Screws on NH3 for all Industrial Refrigeration Projects including ice-cream hardening, frozen storage etc. as used at Hindustan Lever Limited (HAL ) Nasik- Walls Ice cream near Pune- Kirloskars Head Quarters. A photo of this factory is as shown in fig.8.

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Another picture of National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) at Bangalore which uses Howden Screws with liquid NH3 Pumping systems with Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) fully computer controlled and completely automatic operation is shown in Fig,9

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Fig.10 - Fig 11 MDFL Delhi (Mother Dairy)

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Fig. 9 NDDB 5.1 Indias Largest Compressor Manufacturer Kirloskar Pneumatic has been manufacturing the K-110 / KC Reciprocating Open Type Compressors for the last 40 years. These are available both in single stage and two stage versions and have from a minimum of 2 to maximum of 12 cylinders. These can be used for NH3 / R-22 or other common HFCs. The maximum speed of these compressors is 1000 RPM. A typical single stage and two stage compressor is as shown in Fig,.12 and Fig.13

Fig. 12 - Single Stage KC

Fig. 13 -Two Stage KC

5.1.1 Reciprocating Compressors The recips have multiple cylinders and have various steps of unloading. The loading / unloading of cylinders is achieved automatically depending on the load of the system. If part load in between the two steps of certain number of cylinder is required the same can be achieved by using a hot gas bypass system. This is very commonly used particularly for refrigerants like (NH3) ammonia. The reciprocating systems have good COP and may even be better than the screws in many cases particularly for low temperature refrigeration systems. Many-a-times, screws are selected on the basis of so-called, better power consumption but in reality the recips are found to be more efficient and consume less power than the screws particularly at evaporating temperatures of -30C or lower. Typical IPLV at ARI Standard conditions both for screws and recips are as shown in fig.14.

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Fig. 14 Typical IPLV Another comparison of part load performance of piston (recips) compressors and screw compressors is as shown in fig.15.

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Another independent source ref. Cold and Chilled Storage Technology Edited by C.V.J.Dellino published by Blackie and Sons Ltd. Glasgow have made the comparison of COP at part load conditions as shown in fig.16 for reciprocating screw and centrifugal. Fig. 17 Part Load Compressor Performance

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If the effect of other ancillaries in the system is considered the part load curve varies as

shown in fig.15. Fig.15 - Part Load System Performance The compressor performance and hence power cost, is only a part of the total ownership cost of a refrigeration system. The minimum cost can only be achieved by good system design and by maintaining the actual logs at the design level conditions and by taking all corrective actions such as, cleaning of condenser tubes / cooling tower circuit, cleaning of choked filters, choked nozzles etc. maintaining proper refrigerant levels in heat exchangers, degree of superheat, degree of subcooling, pressure drops etc. within limits. Most of the systems thus continue to use the most trusted open reciprocating compressors on NH3 as refrigerant. 5.1.2 Faster Pull Down Low temperature applications such as, plate freezers, Blast freezers, Frozen storages etc. essentially require compressors to be selected at low evaporating temperatures at -30C to -40C or -45C or lower. For these conditions, either booster systems or two stage compound compressors can be selected. In India most selections use internally compounded 2 stage compressors like KC-51, KC-42, KC-72, KC-63 or KC-102 or KC93 etc. All these represent two stage models. The first digit represents the Low stage cylinders and the second digit shows the High stage cylinders. Thus a model KC-51 and KC-42 is a 6 cylinder model which would become KC-6 if it were a single stage compressor.

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When we start the system from ambient pull-down conditions, the compressor will work as a high stage compressor only. When the system achieves temperature of around 15C, it can be operated as a two-stage system. Various steps of loading are given in the compressor manual. The two stage KC-51 compressor will operate as KC-1 with only one cylinder till the temperature comes down. If we select KC-42 and start the compressor it can be made to work as KC-2 compressor by taking care of oversizing the condenser and motor kW suitably. This will give rise to a faster pull down. Depending upon the requirements of initial cooling i.e. the extent of room size, load, brine tank reservoir size etc. and how often this takes place, it may be worthwhile to design the system right at the beginning for a faster pull down. It will be difficult or sometimes impossible to incorporate these changes in the field for achieving faster pull downs once the systems are charged with the refrigerant and commissioned. It is necessary to visualize these right at the design stage so that we get quick cooling of a product in stipulated time periods. The quality of the product to be frozen depends on the speed at which this takes place and the time it requires so that the product is quickly frozen and can be kept for a period of 8 months or longer in a frozen storage room without affecting its overall quality and texture. 6.0 Automation and IT applications Most of the modern cold storages are being planned for more and more automation. Mechanical equipment like Pressure Gauges, Thermometers, Physical logbooks etc. are being replaced with micro process controls and transducers and automatic recorders. The Information Technology, with suitable fully computerized and proper softwares are being developed and used. But many small cold storages still heavily depend on old manual labour. 7.0 Conclusions There is an awareness amongst the Government and the common people, that not only we must increase the production of foodstuff, but preserve it and distribute it properly to a common man in the country. This is possible only by developing the infrastructure of railways, Roads and Merchant shipping. Required Electric power must be generated and in case of power interruptions or failures a back up with generators be kept ready as stand by so that tons of products stored in a cold storages do not get damaged and wasted. People have realized that they cannot survive with strikes and must be prepared to do hard work. Wealth cannot be distributed unless it is created. We see a bright future for India not only in IT sector but all walks of life and Kirloskars have been playing that role for over a century in India and the Globe. A time will come when all the controls will become wireless and can be operated automatically from a remote place. 8.0 Acknowledgments The author is thankful to Mr.Aditya Kowshik of Kirloskar Pneumatic Co. Ltd and Mr. John Mignano of Lu-Ve Contardo Pacific Pty. Ltd, Australia for their encouragement and

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sponsorship. The author wishes to thank Mr.Hiru Jhangiani, Editor of ISHRAE Journal, Bombay for his valuable help and guidance. 9.0 References 1. Report of the High Level Expert Committee on Cold Storage and Storage Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India, Feb.1999. Agree Business and Food Industry Vol.I, Issue 3 Nov. 2003 Published by MB Naqvi on behalf of Media Today Pvt. Ltd. New Delhi, India. Advantages of Open Recip.Compressors by K V Jog, Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Journal Ishrae Mumbai Chapter Vol.7 No.1 Jan March 2004 Recent Trends in Cold Storage Practice by K V Jog Paper presented at IIT Kanpur in December 1968 on The Cold Storage Industry. Cold and Chilled Storage Technology Edited by Clive V J Dellino Published by Blackie and Son Ltd. Glasgow, U.K. Rama - Refrigeration and Air-conditioning Manufacturers Association website: www.ramaindia.org. Industrial Refrigeration Principles, Design and Applications by P.C.Koelet with T B Gray, 1992 Published by Marcel Dekker Inc. New York, USA. York Internationals published paper in HVAC&R Engg.Update Chiller Efficiency, Recip better Than Most Screws 2001.

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