“Hands off” project wins national engineering award

November 2008

A new fully automated packaging and processing project has taken out the mechanical and manufacturing award at the 2008 New Zealand Engineering Excellence Awards at TE PAPA in Wellington last night.

Engineering teams from Fonterra, JMP and Avalon Engineering designed the “lights out” fully automated packaging solution that are now operating in five Fonterra sites that can pack, seal, stack and transport to milk products to storage. One operator simply controls the whole process by remote control.

Using leading edge New Zealand design techniques the automated system incorporates a bag packer, robotic palletiser, stretch wrapper and an automatic guided vehicle. The accuracy and lack of human intervention means the “lights” can be turned off at all Fonterra operations.  

“The design of this “lights out” project is particularly impressive because of the integration of all the various components into a single well-balanced and smoothly operating packaging system that processes more than 2,000 tonnes of milk powder per day”, said David Elms, Convenor of the Category Awards judging panel.

The fourth New Zealand Engineering Excellence Awards are the premier awards for New Zealand engineering professionals. The awards are presented in two major areas: Individual Awards, that recognise leadership, entrepreneurship, and our young engineers; and Category Awards, that recognise achievement in the various industry areas, together with a Supreme Award for the best of the Category winners.

The New Zealand Engineering Excellence Awards are hosted by a consortium of five partners and 10 contributing organisations. The partners are: Centre for Advanced Engineering (CAE); Association of Local Government Engineering New Zealand Incorporated (INGENIUM); Electricity Engineers Association of New Zealand (EEA); Association of Consulting Engineers of New Zealand (ACENZ) and the Institution of Professional Engineers of New Zealand (IPENZ.)

For more information contact:
Chief Executive, IPENZ, Engineers New Zealand.
Mobile: 021 311 879
DDI: 04 474 8935
Prepared by Julie Buchanan, Communications Manager, IPENZ, Engineers NZ,
Mobile: 021 479 885, DDI: 04 473 2028