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How does a wastewater treatment plant affect a dairy plant’s competitiveness? Dariusz Jasak in conversation with Janusz Górski for Forum Mleczarskie Biznes
Rising energy costs, new environmental requirements, ESG reporting obligations, and the ongoing digitalization of production processes are making water and wastewater management one of the key areas in the management of modern dairy plants. Today, wastewater treatment plants are no longer viewed solely as facilities required to meet environmental regulations. Increasingly, they are becoming strategic assets that influence operational reliability, energy efficiency, resource recovery, and overall business competitiveness.
What role do predictive systems, digital twins, and advanced data analytics play in modern dairy processing facilities? Can biogas become a tool for stabilizing energy costs? How is the approach to industrial cybersecurity and water and wastewater management evolving in the era of Industry 5.0?
For many years in the dairy industry, wastewater treatment plants were perceived as a “necessary evil” and a costly end-of-pipe solution. You and SEEN Technologie argue that today they are a key element of systemic security. Is this a paradigm shift, or simply the result of careful economic calculation for every dairy plant?
– It is definitely a paradigm shift, although one driven by very specific economic factors and the growing scale of operational risks – said Dariusz Jasak, CEO of SEEN Technologie, in an interview with Forum Mleczarskie Biznes. – Just a few years ago, wastewater treatment plants were viewed primarily as environmental infrastructure–essential for regulatory compliance but remaining outside the strategic management sphere of a production facility. Today, their role is entirely different. In modern dairy processing, the stability of water and wastewater systems has a direct impact on production continuity, energy efficiency, operational safety, and the quality of the final product. A wastewater treatment plant is no longer the end of the process; it has become an integral component of the entire technological system and one of the factors influencing a plant’s competitiveness.
– More and more often, treatment plants are responsible not only for wastewater treatment but also for the recovery and reuse of process water, energy generation from biogas, recovery of valuable resources, and optimization of utility and chemical consumption costs. In practice, this means that the way water and wastewater management is handled today has a direct impact on a company’s resilience to technological, energy, environmental, and regulatory disruptions.
During your presentation at the European Economic Congress (EEC) in Katowice, you spoke about the transition from a reactive to a predictive operating model. In practice, how do SEEN Technologie’s systems protect dairy plants from technological incidents that could compromise final product quality and, consequently, consumer trust in export markets? Have these solutions already been put to the test, and do you have experience handling crisis situations?
– A reactive model means managing a process only after a problem has already occurred. In today’s dairy industry, this approach is no longer sufficient because process variability is significantly greater than it was just a few years ago. This is due, among other factors, to the frequent reconfiguration of production lines for different product categories, the growing number of shorter production runs, and the dynamic expansion of product portfolios. Every change in the production process also affects wastewater characteristics, including its composition, organic load, and daily fluctuations. That is why the predictive model, based on real-time process data analysis, is becoming increasingly important. Solutions developed by SEEN Technologie enable the simultaneous analysis of multiple technological parameters, the identification of deviations from operational trends, and the prediction of situations that may lead to process instability or the failure of critical equipment. Importantly, we are not talking solely about traditional alarm systems. Operators receive specific optimization recommendations that allow them to respond in advance to bioreactor overloads, deterioration in wastewater quality parameters, or increasing energy consumption within the process. This makes it possible to maintain greater operational stability while reducing operating costs. In practice, these types of solutions are designed primarily to minimize the risk of crisis situations that could affect production continuity or product quality assurance. In the food industry, the stability of technological processes is now directly linked not only to operational efficiency but also to brand reputation and the security of the entire supply chain – added Dariusz Jasak, CEO of SEEN Technologie.
