Magnavale Easton Nears Completion with Installation of Monorails
Leading cold storage provider & Cold Chain Federation member Magnavale, is pleased to announce the installation of high-speed monorails at its 101,000-pallet Grantham-based facility, set to open in late 2024. Installation began on July 17th, 2023, with the monorail system being one of the most technically challenging aspects of the overall infrastructure. The construction took 4 months, wrapping up in mid-November, at which point the expansive track was completed. Spanning almost half a kilometre, the monorail system’s track extends over two levels within the facility.
These monorails are a cutting-edge feature of Magnavale’s infrastructure, with the ability to dynamically adapt their speed to match the volume of pallets entering the cold store, guaranteeing efficiency and flexibility for intake and dispatch. Each of the 54 individual trolleys can carry more than 1200 kg and are maintained via specially designed maintenance areas on each level. While the mechanical specifications of the monorail system are deeply impressive, the advanced control system enables optimal throughput efficiency by adapting the speed of individual trolleys.
Designed for resiliency, the cold storage facility features multiple access points to avoid bottlenecks amid peak holiday periods. The design features built in redundancy planning, with no single points of failure. This effectively prevents disruption risk during periods of heightened operational demand, which is particularly important during peak seasons, such as Christmas.
Combining speed, responsiveness and resilience, the monorail system is crucial for the successful operation of Magnavale’s fully automated cold store. Alongside blast freezing, contract packing, and other cold chain services integrated onsite, Magnavale Easton aims to revolutionise cold chains, cutting unnecessary cost, risk, and complexity.
Magnavale Chief Operating Officer, Amanda Cogan, comments, “We are pleased to see our development coming together. The incorporation of automated cranes and the recent addition of the monorail systems at Magnavale Easton signify a significant evolution in temperature-controlled storage. The Easton facility holds particular significance for us, not merely due to its size or technological advancements, but more importantly, because of the pivotal role it is poised to play in enhancing food production in Lincolnshire and supporting our partners in the surrounding area.”
Magnavale’s new development in Easton, Grantham, is set to become the most efficient cold store in Europe, accommodating a capacity of 101,000 pallets, alongside an existing 44,000 already onsite. The fully automated cold store will operate solely on renewable energy, making it an environmentally sustainable solution for the modern cold storage industry.
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