energy
design
resources
Tortilla Manufacturing Produces
Energy-Saving Opportunities
In recent years, sales of Mission Foods’ Mexican food products have been
increasing so rapidly the company has been building an average of one to two
new production facilities a year. As demand for their product had grown in the
Inland Empire, it was decided the time had come to build a new facility in that
region. The new Mission Foods Production Facility in Rancho Cucamonga is
basically a one-story concrete tilt-up building containing approximately 50,000
square feet for administrative and support areas in a two-story office section,
125,000 square feet for manufacturing, and 134,000 square feet for warehous-
ing. The production and packaging areas are divided into three product-ori-
ented sections: flour tortillas, corn tortillas, and fried products. The warehouse
area also houses large coolers for storing products and ingredients.
Plans for the new facility indicated that the largest energy-consuming sys-
tems in the factory would include process equipment for manufacturing tor-
tillas and chips and refrigeration equipment for storing product. Because food
processing equipment transfers large amounts of heat to a manufacturing area,
space cooling would also be a major load. Since alterations to the process sys-
tems were not feasible, the design team, working with energy consultants from
the electric utility, focused on developing strategies that would reduce energy
requirements for space conditioning. Additional energy efficiency measures
included lighting and glazing efficiency improvements.
One of the primary energy-saving measures of the facility is the use of
evaporative precoolers on the air handlers that serve the manufacturing areas.
These precoolers reduce the temperature of outside air entering the building
and are particularly effective due to the dry climate conditions in the region.
Since the outside air requirement in manufacturing areas is a minimum of 50
percent, the resulting energy savings are substantial. Additionally, indirect evap-
During a meeting to discuss power
needs for the new plant, the local
electric utility offered Mission Foods
the opportunity to participate in its
new construction design assistance
program. Recognizing that they could
reduce their operating costs by
designing their new plant to be ener-
gy efficient, the managers were very
interested in participating, but con-
cerned about negative impacts on
their fast-track construction sched-
ule. As they are now saving over
three hundred thousand dollars
every year on energy costs, mission
foods managers are confident that
their decision to focus on energy
efficiency was the right one.