DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL AND PROCESS

ENGINEERING
SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING
MOI UNIVERSITY

PLANT DESIGN FOR THE PRODUCTION

OF POTATO PUREE, CHIPS AND
EXTRACTION OF POTATO STARCH
By:
MUTUA EDWIN CPE/17/08
LIMO KIPTALAM CPE/12/08
AKAKA EVANS CPE/1005/08
Supervisor: DR.S NAMANGO
1ST FEBRUARY 2013

OBJECTIVE
Design a plant for potato starch,
puree and chips production.

INTRODUCTION
Potato is an edible starchy tuber
produced by certain plants of a genus
Solanum of the Solanaceae family,
especially the common white potato.
Potato is a staple food in most
countries being an annual herb and
varies from brownish-white to purple.
Potatoes require cold storage which
prevents sprouting.

INTRESTED POTATO
PRODUCTS
Starch
- Its a carbohydrate consisting of a
large number of glucose units
joined. Its basically produced by all
green plants as an energy storage.
- Its a white, tasteless and odourless
powder that is insoluble in cold water
or alcohol.

 Puree
- Puree is basically a paste or thick
liquid suspension made from cooked
potato.
- Puree and dehydrated forms
processed from potatoes are the
main ingredients for making liquid
and semi solid products such as
beverages, soup, baby food, ice
cream, baked products and various
snacks.

 Chips
- its a thin slice of potato that is deep
fried or baked until crunchy. Potato
chips are commonly served as an
appetizer or snacks. Basically chips
are cooked and salted having
various flavourings and ingredients.

JUSTIFICATION
Potato crop takes an average of 4
months to mature compared to other
crops e.g. maize, wheat which takes
an average of 10 months.
Cereals especially maize is used for
food security in Kenya hence its use
for starch production interferes with
government food security policies.

LITERATURE REVIEW
PRODUCTION OF POTATO PRODUCTS
Starch extraction: Basically this is a
method of getting starch a carbohydrate
from starch containing plants e.g potato
Chips production: This entails the
chipping of potato and precooking for
consumption normally referred as frozen
chips.
Puree production: This entails mashing of
potatoes basically for consumption.

 This potato products make the

essence of creating the company in
Kenya having the possibility of
starting a potato company which
will utilise the gap experienced
faced now.

PROCESS DESCRIPTION
1. Starch extraction
The techniques involved in starch
extraction include:
-Cleaning
-Rasping
-Extraction & Fruit water separation
-Dewatering & Drying

 The potatoes are cleaned to remove soil and stones

through washing machine where the potato are spinned
around.
The purified potatoes are mashed by a rotary saw blade
resulting in complete disruption of the potato cells
releasing the starch. The machine eliminates skin
fragments which lead to poor starch quality.
Separation is done by conical rotating sieves. For better
starch isolation water is applied to the sieves through
nozzles. While starch and fruit water passes through, the
fibres are retarded by the sieves. the fruit water is
separated in several steps by means of hydro-cyclone.
The refined starch milk has a dry matter content of about
35 % to 40 %. The starch is dewatered by rotary vacuum
filtration to moisture contents below 40 %.Drying is
conducted by means of a flash dryer. Starch must not
exceed 15 % of residual moisture to be suitable for storage.

2. Chips production
The techniques involved in chips
production include:
- Washing
- Peeling
- Cutting
- Washing and drying
- Blanching
- Par frying
- Drying
- Cooling and freezing

 Washing is done using high-pressure spray washers; water at 250

psi is directly sprayed at the surface of potatoes as they tumble
over rotating brushes.
Peeling is done by use of high pressure steam where losses are
between 10-15% and depend on the efficiency of the equipment.
Tubers are cut lengthwise to obtain maximum long sticks with
minimum loss. Strips shorter than 30 mm are removed and taken
to the starch extraction section.
Materials that come out of cut potato cells cause the products to
stick together and to cook unevenly. They are removed by washing
and dried using mechanical de-watering.
Hot water blanching at 65oc-100oc destroys enzyme activity and
leaches out, reducing sugars and other chemical constituents that
cause off-colour and off flavour.
Evaporation of water from cut surfaces before deep-frying gives
chips their characteristic crispy exterior.
The pre-cooked chips are dried using cold air at 20 oc.
The product is cooled and deep-frozen at -18 to -20C in order to
retain texture and avoid damage as a result of ice crystal
formation.

3. Puree
The techniques involved in puree
production include:
- Washing
- Peeling and rewashing
- Cutting
- Pureeing process
- Canning and freezing

 Its produced by steam cooking of the peeled potato roots and

passing the cooked materials through a pulp finisher. The material
are blanched at 65 to 75C. the blanched materials into puree is
carried out at this point using the hammer mill. The blanched
puree is pumped into a surge tank and held at 65 - 75C for
further starch hydrolysis. Raw potato mash can be added at this
stage to increase starch conversion. After starch conversion, the
temperature is raised to 100 - 110C in a heat exchanger to
inactivate the enzymes, and a final grinding step will be carried
out with the use of a pulp finisher to obtain the smooth puree.
The finish-cooked puree is packaged in plastic containers for
refrigerated or frozen storage. pH adjustment of potato puree to
1.5, 4.5 and 11.5 prior to filling in jars followed by pasteurizing at
90C could prolong the shelf-life of the product up to 9 months at
room temperature.

APPLICATION OF STARCH
1.
-.
-.
-.

Starch may be used as food;

Ingredient in making medicines.
It is used as food thickener in soups.
Carefully selected starches help make
yogurts.
2. Starch as raw material in industrial
products
-. As filler in papermaking.
-. Preparing laundry starch

MASS BALANCE
The conservation equation is as follows:
Accumulation = Material in + Generation - Consumption
Material out

The mass balance was carried out in each

equipment.
Assumptions
Targeted counties:
- Nakuru, Baringo, Uasin Gishu and Bomet
- Approximately annual production is 200 MT
according to Kenya Agricultural Institute.

-Service sector consumption-60%

-Domestic consumption-30%
-Remaining-10%
Assume 300 working days
Basis calculations:
0.1 x 200=20MT

MASS BALANCE AROUND THE

RASPING UNIT
Assumptions
- Skin fragments = 0.5% weight.
- 30% of potato is used for starch extraction.
- 70% of potato is used for chips and puree.
- 10% of water remains with the skin.

MASS BALANCE AROUND FLASH

DRYER
Assumptions:
- 90% efficiency.
- Proteins and starch do not evaporate.

ENERGY BALNCE
conservation of energy equation:
Accumulation = Energy in - Energy out +
Generation - Consumption
Assumptions
A reference temperature of 20is used in the
analysis
Specific heat capacity of water do not vary with
temperature
C pwater = 4.187 KJ/Kg.C
Specific heat capacity of potato vary with moisture
content and is given by the following formula
C p potato = 0.0335 X %M.C + 0.8374

ENERGY BALANCE AROUND ROTARY DRYER

Assumption:
no starch is vaporized.
Negligible energy loss.
CP cld air = 1.25 Kj/kg
CP moist air = CP water

Component

Input (Kj/hr)

Output (Kj/hr)

Semidried
starch

49060

Dried starch

55750

Moist air

67486.64

Hot air

74176.64

Total

123236.64

123236.64

ENERGY BALANCE AROUND THE

DRYER

Component

Input (Kj/hr)

Output
(Kj/hr)

Feed( chips &

water)

182011.7

Product(chips &
water)

31058.6

Cold air

50000

warm air

56250

THANK YOU