Golden Fields Alternative Protein puts Schule plant into operation

August 20, 2024 - After around one year of construction, the Reinbek-based machine manufacturer Schule Mühlenbau has completed a state-of-the-art plant for processing peas and faba beans. The customer is Golden Fields Alternative Protein, an international producer and supplier of agricultural products. The Northern European company focuses on the cultivation, processing and export of cereals, oilseeds and pulses. With the new plant in Liepaja, Latvia, the company expands its product range, while Schule has won a new partner in the production of high-quality plant-based proteins.

Exterior view of the Golden Fields Alternative Protein factory in Liepaja, Latvia; source: Golden Fields Alternative Protein.

Golden Fields Alternative Protein relies on sustainable cultivation methods and modern agricultural technologies to produce high-quality products. To this end, the company cooperates closely with regional farmers. Golden Fields Alternative Protein planned early on to include plant-based proteins in its product range as raw materials for plant-based foods for human consumption. As in future it will no longer be possible to meet the global demand with animal proteins obtained from fish or meat for example, high-quality vegetable proteins are more in demand than ever as healthy alternatives. That is where Schule Mühlenbau came in two years ago. For over 130 years, the Kahl subsidiary has designed and built turnkey plants for the oat and rice industry as well as for a wide variety of cereals, oilseeds and legumes. At the end of 2022, Schule was awarded a contract for the design and construction of a processing line for peas and faba beans.

The market for plant-based proteins is growing continuously

Schule manufactures all the machines required for legume processing at its main site in Reinbek near Hamburg. Thorsten Lucht, Area Sales Manager at Schule Mühlenbau, explains: "Extracting proteins from legumes requires many different processing steps and a great depth of expertise. In addition to cleaning and sorting, this includes dehulling, separating, fine grinding and separating into protein-rich and starch-rich fractions."

Two conical hulling machines (type Verticone VPC320) are the centrepieces of the plant: After fine cleaning and classification, the peas and beans are hulled using a conical stone set. Depending on the setting, the machine grinds the surface more or less intensively and thus removes all adhering hull parts with pinpoint accuracy, without damaging the kernels. The resulting mixture of hulls and meal is then extracted and can be pelleted for various purposes, for example for use in animal feed. The Verticone VPC boasts variable settings, especially for the adjustment of the hulling gap, which ensures precise control of the final product quality. Unlike other dehulling machines, Schule relies exclusively on a conical hulling machine which guarantees the highest yield and lowest losses. After all, it is particularly important to minimise unnecessary losses when it comes to cost-intensive products such as vegetable proteins. After hulling, the hulled kernels are finely ground and separated into a protein-rich and a starch-rich fraction for human consumption using separation technology.

"Due to global population growth and the increasing demand for sustainably produced food, the need for high-quality proteins has been rising for years," explains Mahmoud Ahmed, CEO, Golden Fields Alternative Protein. "With our new plant in Liepaja, which Schule Mühlenbau planned, built and commissioned just-in-time, we are ideally prepared for this future market in Northern Europe."

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