Oro de Cacao AG, Freienbach, Switzerland

In Frei­en­bach in the can­ton of Schwyz, inve­stors around Die­ter Mei­er built a modern cho­co­la­te fac­to­ry that pro­du­ces the finest cho­co­la­te using a world­wi­de revo­lu­tio­na­ry, paten­ted cold extra­c­tion process.

As the pro­cess is com­ple­te­ly new on the mar­ket, the­re is no com­pa­ra­ble plant any­whe­re. We had the pri­vi­le­ge of sup­port­ing Oro de Cacao with a con­sul­tan­cy man­da­te on pro­cess auto­ma­ti­on issues at an ear­ly stage. Our team inte­gra­ted the cacao cold extra­c­tion, CIP and cho­co­la­te pro­duc­tion equip­ment into the auto­ma­ti­on frame­work pro­vi­ded by the cli­ent. Our scope of sup­p­ly con­si­sted of: Pro­ject manage­ment, elec­tri­cal design, switch­gear cons­truc­tion and soft­ware engi­nee­ring. For the spray tower we sup­plied the switch gear cabi­nets which were desi­gned and built in St. Gallen.

A big chall­enge in the pro­ject was the short rea­li­sa­ti­on time pai­red with a new pro­cess. The result was that cons­truc­tion and mecha­ni­cal works were always only one step ahead, which trig­ge­red many engi­nee­ring chan­ges. The­se were tight­ly moni­to­red and proac­tively dis­cus­sed with the cli­ent. In this way, we ensu­red a high qua­li­ty of engi­nee­ring during com­mis­sio­ning, achie­ved on-time com­mis­sio­ning after com­ple­ti­on of the indi­vi­du­al sub-systems and avo­ided addi­tio­nal costs

Client

Oro de Cacao AG

Plant type

Cho­co­la­te factory

Project execution

2020 to 2021

Project scope

• 2950 data points
• 6 stan­ding cabi­nets, sheet steel, total 15 fields
• 3 stan­ding cabi­nets stain­less steel HD-design, total 12 fields
• 6 front cabi­nets stain­less steel HD-design

Our services

• Con­cept design and consulting
• Elec­tri­cal engineering
• Crea­te func­tion­al design spe­ci­fi­ca­ti­on (FDS) Software
• Crea­te FDS Fail Safe
• Soft­ware engineering
• Pro­ject engi­nee­ring of visua­li­sa­ti­on system
• IO-link engi­nee­ring
• Switch­gear construction
• On site panel modifications
• Signal test and start-up
• Ope­ra­tor training

Technology applied

• Won­der­wa­re systemplattform
• Sie­mens fail safe PLC
• PROFINET
• IO-Link
• EPlan P8

Contact

Mar­cel Fust, Head of Con­cept Design & Con­sul­ting, Schmid Auto­ma­ti­on AG