YES, they can: with two new Krones lines, the Taiwanese beverage producer YES is increasing performance and quality levels and reducing energy consumption.
YES is particularly well known throughout Taiwan for its excellent water quality and fills mainly still mineral water but also alkaline water with a pH value of between 7.5 and 9.5.
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YES
A Krones line has been up and running at YES, Taiwan’s biggest mineral water bottler, since April 2023. The second turnkey line is scheduled to follow in April 2024. These two lines are instrumental in both significantly upsizing production capacities and improving the company’s carbon footprint.
Mountains as far as the eye can see, up to 600 metres high. Snow-capped peaks. We are on the north-eastern coast of Taiwan, in the Yilan region, about an hour away from the capital Taipei. The soil is supplied with nutrients by streams and rivers, which turn this region into one of the island’s granaries.
This is where Young Energy Source Co., Ltd. – or YES for short – bottles a remarkably pure mineral water, sourced from the surrounding mountainside. The spring water is naturally filtered more than 200 metres underground in quartz-filled layers of rock formed over 30 million years ago.
YES bottles its mineral water directly at the source.
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YES
YES owns the entire mountain range surrounding the spring and is thus able to give it adequate protection.
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YES
This is complemented by the superlative expertise of the company’s water sommeliers, who ensure top quality regarding both purity and taste. They were trained at the Doemens Academy, an international training institute headquartered in Germany, which has more than 100 years of experience in providing education, training and consultancy services to the brewing, food and beverage industries. And that expertise definitely pays off since the water bottled by YES is the only water in Taiwan to have won the International Quality Institute’s Grand Gold Award. This institute grades consumer goods and bestows unique seals of quality.
The experts of the International Quality Institute gave this award to the water bottled by YES, describing it as particularly smooth, well-rounded and sweet.Image credits:
YES
Bring on the water!
YES is particularly well known throughout Taiwan for its excellent water quality, bottling mainly still mineral water, but also alkaline water with a pH value of between 7.5 and 9.5. Their portfolio also includes juices and tea-based beverages. All its production and bottling kit is housed in two factories with an overall floor space of several thousand hectares, located directly at the water’s source. The firm’s customers include supermarkets, airlines and more than 1,000 hotels. Whoever spends their holidays in Taiwan will most probably drink mineral water bottled by YES.
In 2024, the enterprise will celebrate its 35th anniversary. And they have set themselves some ambitious goals: to increase production output, tap into the international market and improve their carbon footprint. “As the biggest water bottler in Taiwan, we feel it’s important to use the best technology available,” emphasises Jordan Chen, Managing Director at YES. He and his colleagues chose two Krones lines internally known as K1 and K2. K1 has been up and running since April 2023. It is the first turnkey water line that Krones supplied to Taiwan. K2 is scheduled to go into operation in April 2024.
“As the biggest water bottler in Taiwan, we feel it’s important to use the best technology available.” Jordan Chen, Managing Director at YESImage credits:
YES
Energy-efficient bottling operation
The centrepiece of K1 is an ErgoBloc LM wet-end block consisting of stretch blow moulder, labeller and filler with screw-capper, which has been specifically developed for filling still mineral water into PET bottles of various sizes. When handling the smallest bottle, which holds 0.6 litres, the line fills 45,000 containers per hour, while it can reach an output of 24,500 containers per hour for the 1.45-litre bottle.
YES sets store by ensuring quality
Since the bottles are handled with utmost care, they retain their integrity throughout the whole filling process with no scratches whatsoever, which is mainly attributable to the SynCo container conveyor.
Fill level accuracy is perfect, so every bottle is filled with precisely the same amount of water, which is monitored by a Checkmat FEM-X fill-level inspector.
The bottles are carefully labelled by the Contiroll TS machine. TS stands for top speed – in this way, the line guarantees a maximum of both quality and speed.
Further benefits of the block-synchronised machine configuration are its small footprint in comparison to a single installation machine and the fact that a single operator can easily control every piece of equipment. Full-coverage automation also contributes towards enhanced occupational safety. Another advantage of the block layout is its proven energy-efficiency: the system doesn’t need any transfer starwheels or redundant components, which helps reduce energy consumption, assisted by the height-adjustable base reflector and the frequency-controlled neck finish cooling unit.
Moreover, YES joined forces with Krones to develop lightweight bottles which minimise energy consumption even further. The optimised design of the Contiform blow moulder series and the newly developed machines for preform production were instrumental in reducing the bottle weight by an impressive 44 per cent. The preform machines also ensure that the physical stability of these lightweight bottles is much better than that of previous models.
YES produces all preforms and blow moulded bottles in-house, thus avoiding additional CO2 emissions that would otherwise be caused by transporting them to the factory. “All in all, we’ve been able to reduce our carbon footprint by 15 per cent during the production process,” says a gratified Jordan Chen. The Taiwanese Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) has issued YES with the Carbon Footprint Label for its efforts.
We’ve been able to reduce our carbon footprint during the production process by 15 per cent.
Jordan ChenManaging Director at YES
Two lines with the same goals: performance, quality, safety
The second line will also process the newly developed lightweight bottles and fill mineral water. In order to expand the company’s portfolio, it’srequired to handle different types of labels and bottles: 0.33-litre, 0.55-litre and 2.20-litre sizes. Among other things, it comprises a Modulfill VFJ filler, an Ergomodul labeller, a Variopac Pro WT-FS packer and a Modulpal Pro 2A palletiser. “The line thus offers plenty of flexibility, mainly as far as bottle shapes and labelling are concerned, and is even more efficient than our first one, especially with smaller batches,” says Jordan Chen. The goals targeted with this line are the same as for K1: increasing performance, quality and safety, and cutting energy consumption.
The line offers plenty of flexibility, mainly as far as bottle shapes and labelling are concerned.
Jordan ChenManaging Director at YES
Project:
Two bottling lines for mineral water
Customer:
Young Energy Source Co., Ltd. (YES)
Location:
Yilan, Taiwan
Line 1:
Speeds: 24,500 (for 1.45-litre bottles) to 45,000 containers (for 0.6-litre bottles) per hour
