Case file / Food and beverage processing
Tulare dairy processing
A split roof-and-yard system for a dairy processor running 24 hours through the flush. A compressed-air survey done during the audit removed enough load to shrink the array before it was designed.
- Array
- 1,480 kW DC
- Inverters
- 1,250 kW AC
- Annual output
- 2,590 MWh
- Permission to operate
- June 2025
Specification
The numbers on the record
| Client | Sierra Crest Dairy Foods |
|---|---|
| Location | Tulare, CA |
| Array rating | 1,480 kW DC |
| Inverter rating | 1,250 kW AC (DC to AC ratio 1.18) |
| Modules | 2,691 at 550 W |
| Structure | Roof array plus fixed-tilt yard field |
| Storage | 750 kW / 1,500 kWh |
| Modelled annual production | 2,590,000 kWh |
| Specific yield | 1,750 kWh per kW DC per year |
| Load offset | 44 percent |
| Construction window | 19 weeks |
| Permission to operate | June 2025 |
What made it hard
The constraints
- Continuous 24-hour operation meant a large overnight base load that generation could never reach.
- Compressed air was the second largest load in the plant and nobody had measured it in six years.
- Roof area alone could not carry a meaningful share of the load, so the design had to cross two structures and a yard.
What we did about it
The approach
- A leak survey and compressor sequencing change cut average compressed-air demand by roughly 90 kW before a single module was ordered.
- Array split across the main process roof and a fixed-tilt field on unused yard, sharing one interconnection point.
- Battery sized against the measured evening demand peak rather than the daytime average, since the tariff punished 4pm to 9pm demand hardest.
- Harmonic and power-factor baseline measured during the audit, with drive filtering specified where distortion exceeded the utility threshold.
Result
Outcome
- System size
- 1,480 kW DC / 1,250 kW AC
- Modelled annual output
- 2,590,000 kWh
- Load offset
- 44 percent
- Compressed-air saving
- About 90 kW of average demand removed
- Evening peak reduction
- 610 kW
Tulare dairy processing, Tulare, CAThey found ninety kilowatts of leaking air before they sold us a single panel. That is not how this usually goes.
More work
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Bring us the bill before you bring us the roof
Every project starts with twelve months of interval data and a load shape. The array comes after that, sized to what you actually use.
CSLB #1071482 (sample). Prevailing wage on public works. Engineers answer, not a call centre.