Several years ago, a large U.S. cheese plant added an ultrafiltration system to recover whey proteins. The plant was specified to run 2 million lbs of whey per day, producing an 80% whey protein concentrate. But upon startup, the WPC was only 75-77%. The lower quality concentrate had to be sold in a different market at a substantially lower price, costing the dairy about $15,000 a month in lost profits.
The plant manager called GEA Filtration, and the company's membrane filtration service personnel visited the plant, evaluated the situation and found a
problem with the process design. They recommended changes, helped implement them, and trained the operators to run the system, bringing the WPC product up to the 80% spec.