AU2018102065A4 - Farm Gate Preparation of Milk for Long Range Transport Through Ship - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention relates to the preparation of milk for long-range transport, including: novel teat jacket produced of fibre glass material with diamond coat to reduce bacteria sedimentation; pipeline with openable jackets to connect smart photo-sensitive sensors for milk testing through a see-through pipe tubing; real-time monitoring of raw milk as it is being harvested from the cow and flowing into the pressurised tanker; smart milking system for minimal external atmosphere exposure of milk and direct injection into pressurised tanker within 24 hours of milking; and smart cooling system for temperature control through piping until storage.

Description

There are four pages in the description only .

2018102065 13 Dec 2018

Description

The value of dairy exports to China in 2016-17 was about $403 million, up from $144m five years prior. China is also taking 67 per cent of Australia’s $45m infant formula export market, compared to 26 per cent five years ago. Australian dairy products are highly regarded by Chinese consumers for its superior quality that is derived from the industry best practices used in the production. Australia currently hold the opportunity to expand capability to provide more dairy to China over the coming years given the right steps are taken in ensuring a sustainable growth and development in capacity as well as technology.

Traditionally, Milk is either airfreighted or powdered to be exported overseas. This is mainly due to the short shelf life and the complexities that the bacterial formation can bring within milk. Raw milk can carry dangerous bacteria such as Salmonella, E. coli, Listeria, Campylobacter, and others that cause foodborne illness, often called “food poisoning.” These bacteria can seriously injure the health of anyone who drinks raw milk or eats products made from raw milk. However, the bacteria in raw milk can be especially dangerous to people with weakened immune systems (such as transplant patients and individuals with HIV/AIDS, cancer, and diabetes), children, older adults, and pregnant women. Airfreight of milk has proven to be very expensive simply because of air freight and related charges, and on the other hand, powdered milk removes many of the nutritional qualities of the original milk thus rendering it as a simple substitute of real Australian milk.

As a part of innovating new technologies to allow the acceleration of dairy exports out of Australia, we had been granted a patent that allows the sea freight of raw milk (IP NUMBER 2018101306) by suspending the growth of inherent bacteria by introducing carbon dioxide gas. This process creates a wide opportunity to be able to provide fresh Australian milk to Asian markets at a competitive price and at the same time be able to prove its safety and provenance using our patented smart supply chain technology (IP NUMBER 2018101016).

The process used in the above two patents allow the extension of shelf life of the raw milk upto 21 days. Although this maybe a ground breaking technology that is primed to disrupt the market for dairy transport, we found that limiting the exposure of external atmospheric

2018102065 13 Dec 2018 bacteria would enhance the ability of this technology to extend the shelf life of the milk further than the stipulated 21 days. To this effect, the following innnovation pertains to the containment and limitation of external exposure of raw milk from the cow until the time it has been injected into our technology.

The innovation is a physical system that is able to collect and transfer aseptically, the milk, through a staggered chilled tube into a holding unit and directly sparged into the specialised pressure tanker stored between 30 - 50 Psi.

Milk leaves the udder at a temperature of around 37 °C. Fresh milk from a healthy cow is practically free from bacteria but it must still be protected from being contaminated after it has left the udder. Microorganisms capable of spoiling the milk are everywhere - on the udder, on the milkers’ hands, on airborne dust particles and water droplets, on straw and chaff, on the cow’s hair and in the soil. It is common to filter the milk before it enters the milk tank. Therefore, it is important to take every possible step to ensure that any exposure to such elements are minimised. This would involve the use of best practices in food handling and surgical grade materials and instruments throughout the system from milking to final pressurised storage in our specialised tanks.

The complete system cosists of four main procedures, these procedure ensure that the raw milk is in perfect shape for an optimal use with the pressurized storage system. Each of these stages involves specialised equipments and are installed with smart sensors that are able to relay real time information that is fed into our existing patented smart supply chain.

Efficient cooling of the raw milk after milking is the best way to prevent bacterial growth Careful attention must be paid to hygiene in order to produce milk of high bacteriological quality. However, despite all precautions, it is near impossible to completely exclude bacteria from milk. Milk is an excellent growth medium for bacteria; it contains all the nutrients they need. Thus, as soon as bacteria get into milk, they start to multiply. On the other hand, the milk leaving the teats contains certain original bactericides which protect the milk against the action of microorganisms during an initial period after extraction. It also takes some time for infecting microorganisms to adapt to the new medium before they can

2018102065 13 Dec 2018 begin to grow. It is important to keep the milk at low temperature during storage. The activity of the microorganisms will easily increase again if the temperature is allowed to rise some few degrees above recommended storage temperature.

The milking system is divided into the milking side and the pulsator side. When the system is turned on, vacuum is created everywhere by a vacuum pump that removes air from the system. When the cows are not attached to the milking system, the vacuum created will be the same on both the milking side and the pulsator side of the system. When the cows are attached to the milking system by the milking claws, milk and vacuum are present on the milking side. This will cause the vacuum on the milking side of the system to be somewhat lower than the vacuum on the pulsator side. The pulsator side will never have milk, only vacuum or air.

The easiest way to understand the milking system is to look at the action taking place at the teat cup level. There are 4 teat cups with liners attached to the milking claw. The area between the liner and the claw is part of the pulsator side of the system. The area between the teat and the liner is on the milking side of the system. The pulsators are devices that sit on top of the pulsator lines on the pulsator side of the system. They alternately expose the area between the liner and the shell to air and vacuum. The liner are created of a fibre glass material that is coated in diamond. This allows minimal bacteria sedimentation on the inner walls and achieves the goal of minimising external contamination of the milk.

As the milk travels through the pipes, it travels through a coiled tubing that runs through sterile cold water of 0 degrees celcium for approximately 2 minutes where is its quickly chilled to 4 degree celcius. At this point, the milk enters a holding tanks that is continuously churning and agitating in order to keep the milk fats from sedimenting. It also helps in maintaining the overall temperature of the liquid. The pipes that carry the the milk through the cooling system have sleeves that are rectractable in several locations. This will give an inspector a clear view of the milk’s physical properties such as colour and viscosity. The patented smart supply chain allows for photosensitive sensors to analyse the milk running

2018102065 13 Dec 2018 through the pipe in real time and asses temperature, bacteria, fat and other pathogens. This allows the production managers to immediately take action on any issues that may arise in the quality of the milk. The sensors also capture this data to store in our patented smart supply chain which will then be reflected to the exporting and importing governments as well as customers as an irrefutable proof of the quality and safety of the milk from production.

Once this milk is filled up in the holding tank, it begins to flow into the 23,000 indivdual pressurised tankers equipped with a sparging machine that introduces the carbon dioxide. This process thus immediately suspends the bacteria from multiplying immediately. Through this process, a majority of exposure to external bacterias have been minmized and shelf life maximised. This system is a fully integrated to a smart milking system that is enabled by the patented smart supply chain and creates a completely new world class method for exporting premium fresh milk overseas.

Claims (5)

1. Claims

   1. Novel teat jacket produced of fibre glass material with diamond coat which reduced bacteria sedimentation
2. 2. Pipeline with openable jackets to connect smart photo sensitive sensors for milk testing through a see-through pipe tubing
3. 3. Real time monitoring of raw milk as it is being harvested from the cow and flowing into the pressurised tanker
4. 4. Smart milking system for minimal external atmosphere exposure of milk and direct injection into pressurised tanker within 24 hours of milking.
5. 5. Smart cooling system for temperature control through piping until storage.