Chilling Choices: Exploring Various Types of Cold Storage

Two main Types of Cold Storage

The two most common forms of refrigerated storage are:

Refrigerated cold storage

Refrigerated cold storage includes keeping items at a temperature higher than freezing but lower than room temperature. It is frequently employed for perishable food, medicine, and dairy. Most cold storage facilities maintain an environment between 32 and 50 degrees Fahrenheit (zero and ten degrees Celsius). Refrigerated warehouses, walk-in coolers, and containers are all cold storage facilities.

Frozen cold storage

Frozen cold storage preserving goods for long periods by storing them below freezing. Frozen foods, meats, fish, ice cream, and other things that must be held for a long time are frequently stored in this manner. Facilities designed to preserve frozen perishables often keep the temperature below -18 degrees Celsius (-0.4 degrees Fahrenheit). Frozen cold storage solutions include, but are not limited to, freezers, cold rooms, and specialized freezer containers.

What Are Different Types of Cold Storage?

Here are 4 main types of cold storage rooms that come in various sizes and durations of use for enterprises, catering to a wide range of products and storage needs.

1. Bulk Cold Stores

Typically, these facilities are intended to keep a specific seasonal commodity, such as potatoes, apples, chili peppers, etc. Temporary cold storage during off-seasons is a resource-saving method. It stores the cold energy from the winter and uses it for free cooling in the summer.

The generated cold energy is stored in a tank as ice. In the summer, it is tapped as a chilled water source for cooling supplies, cutting down on the time the chillers need to be on and, in turn, the amount of power used and greenhouse gasses emitted.

2. Cold Storage for Frozen Food

The second type of cold room in the warehouse can be outfitted with processing and freezing capabilities for perishables, including fish, meat, poultry, dairy products, processed foods, and fresh vegetables. When it comes to food safety, frozen foods have a stellar reputation. The industry standard for preserving food is -18 degrees Celsius, usually where they are kept.

To avoid contamination, long-term preservation of dry and frozen foods requires retaining their original structure and chemical composition. Thawing or tempering frozen meals is expected in the food preparation pipeline.

Industrial thawing often involves submerging frozen food in water for several hours. To facilitate chopping and handling, the temperature of frozen items is lowered to just below freezing during tampering.

Compared to other preservation methods like heating or drying, one of the main benefits of freezing preservation is that it protects with minimal influence on food quality. Most frozen food is kept at zero and thirty degrees below zero Fahrenheit. However, every product has a different optimal storage temperature.

3. Controlled Atmosphere (CA) Cold Stores

CA cold stores are one of the main cold storage types that keep particular foods, primarily vegetables and fruit, fresh and longevity after collecting from the field.

CA storage has become an integral part of the food storage sector in the last 50 years, allowing for year-round availability of foods that are often only available at certain times of the year.

This storage method is chemical-free; instead, it relies on a low-oxygen, high-carbon dioxide storage atmosphere and refrigeration.

In some cases, carbon monoxide must be added after removing ethylene. Capital-intensive and costly to operate and maintain, this cold storage is best reserved for goods that benefit from extended storage periods, such as kiwis, apples, and pears.

Vegetables with a high respiration rate can be preserved with this method, which shows great promise. Advantages abound when using controlled atmosphere storage, a game-changer when first introduced to the food storage business.

4. Walk-in Cold Storage

Walk-in coolers are climate-controlled rooms that can be entered directly from the outside, making them ideal for storing and retrieving perishable goods. They find widespread application in retail outlets dealing with food preparation and sale. Temperatures in walk-in coolers are typically between 0 and 10 degrees Celsius (32 and 50 degrees Fahrenheit), above freezing but below room temperature. They provide plenty of room for storing many items and come with insulation, temperature controls, and refrigeration units.

5. Small Cold storage

Pre-cooling capabilities are built into these cold storage facilities specifically for fresh fruits, grapes, and other perishables that will be exported. Mechanical refrigeration, electric, and passive evaporative cooling are only some cooling methods for small-scale businesses. The predicted financial profits, the sort of product that needs to be chilled, and the pre-cooling system's cost should all factor into the final decision.

6. Multi-purpose cold storage

To hold a wide variety of goods, multi-purpose cold storage facilities are built with that goal, hence the name. These cold storage facilities are adaptable and can store a wide variety of temperature-sensitive products. They were developed to meet the needs of a wide range of items with specific temperature requirements.

Multi-purpose cold storage facilities are distinguished by their ability to house multiple temperature-controlled environments. Distinct products have distinct ideal temperature ranges for storage, and these zones can be set and managed independently.

Conclusion

Several sectors use types of cooling storage room facilities to extend product viability, maintain product quality, and preserve product freshness.

In a refrigerator, temperatures are kept between 0 and 10 degrees Celsius, much below ambient temperature but still above freezing. It works wonderfully for preserving foodstuffs, medicines, and other perishables. Frozen storage, however, includes keeping items at or below freezing, usually below -18 degrees Celsius, to ensure their long-term viability.

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