C&L Refrigeration Designs & Installs
Industrial Process Chiller System for Golden State Foods Plant

Golden State Foods, located in the City of Industry, CA was founded in 1947 and since 1967 has been a primary supplier for McDonalds. For the last 15 years Golden State Foods has partnered with and utilized C&L Refrigeration to provide refrigeration and air conditioning solutions to their City of Industry manufacturing plant.

When Golden State Foods was recently in need of upgrading their process chiller and expanding their Liquid Products production they looked to C&L for solutions. The process chiller, used for a variety of condiments, syrups, toppings, dressings and sauces (such as Big Mac sauce), is an extremely critical part of the factory's operation. 100% Reliability and very close temperature control are of the utmost importance to Golden State Foods and are an essential component required in meeting their high standard of product quality. C&L took the challenge and utilized its engineering, construction, and service departments to provide GSF with an industrial process chiller system to meet this strict criterion.

The new chiller system was designed with four 40HP compressors that produce a total of 120 tons of refrigeration. Because of the importance of reliability and redundancy, each compressor operates on individual refrigerant circuits and controls and can be isolated for maintenance while the other circuits are running.

Due to the varying loads throughout the day on the production floor, the new system is equipped with unloading capabilities on each compressor which allow the system to meet every possible load condition and operate more efficiently.

The end result is a reliable and efficient industrial process chiller system which will provide years of reliable service, and due to the designed extra capacity will be able to grow over the years with Golden State Foods.

Challenges and Solutions

Challenge: Design and build a system which will guarantee constant glycol temperatures in the plant at all times.

Solution: Two complete process chillers, each with two separate circuits, were installed to provide GSF with 100% redundancy. This design will allow scheduled maintenance to be performed while eliminating chiller down time.

Challenge: Provide exact glycol temperature control to plant.

Solution: C&L Refrigeration installed a three-way glycol mixing valve which ensures an exact glycol temperature is maintained at all times.

Challenge: Design an environmentally friendly system.

Solution: C&L Refrigeration designed and installed a system which operates on non ozone depleting R-507 refrigerant rather than the more common halocarbon refrigerant R-22. Each chiller has a refrigerant leak detector system installed to monitor the area for any refrigerant leaks. Additionally, both systems operate with water cooled condensers which allow the compressors to operate at lower temperatures and use less energy than with standard air cooled condensers.