41119_Niro jubilaeumsbog_blok_uk - GEA Niro

Niro

Niro – 75 years without borders
Published by Niro to mark the company’s 75th anniversary
Copenhagen 2008 · ©Niro

Milk plant, Argentina.

Congratulations on the 75 years 6
Johan Ernst Nyrop: the man behind the success 8
The man who invented the wheel 14
Niro’s global network 18
The American dream came true 20
Times change 22
From Lilliput to world player 25
A partner on many fronts 26
Small department, great success 32
The challenges of drying milk 34
In cowboy country 38
Infant formula: a vital alternative 40
Practical problem cracker 43
How Niro stacks up in the environment 44
The coffee chronicle 48
Plastic is used everywhere 52
Niro strikes while the iron is hot 54
Little brother standing on his own two feet 56
About development and technological milestones 60

Congratulations on the 75 years
Dear friends and colleagues,
No matter how you look at it, Niro has had a
remarkable history! The company’s growth from
its founding in 1933 through today shows its strength
and value. Niro was an international company
long before globalization became a buzzword.
Even more importantly, as the articles in this book
show, Niro has been a pioneer within a number
of technologies that are necessary for people and
societies across the world.
Niro’s results are impressive, but just how exactly
have we achieved them? First and foremost, we’d
like to point to two areas: namely, our fantastic
employees and our strong corporate culture. We’ve
been in a position to be able to attract and educate
the best engineers within our field, and many of
them have made their careers within Niro and
have shown great loyalty to the company.
This 75th anniversary book should be seen as a
tribute to the generations of outstanding Niro
employees who have contributed to our valued
corporate culture.
6 | 7
Openness and flexibility
It is a culture that is marked by professionalism, high
working standards as well as the courage to think
innovatively – and not least of all the willingness
to travel around the world in search of new opportunities.
Niro’s employees have the right entrepreneurial
spirit and are prepared to solve technological
challenges, which makes us open to and flexible
regarding new initiatives. These characteristics
contributed to making us a global player and
technological leader, and they made Niro attractive
to GEA in 1993.
Niro’s fundamental strengths are still the same.
They have been an important tool as we’ve become
part of GEA’s success, and they are the key to our
future development.
International collaboration
In a world that is becoming increasingly globalized,
we face new opportunities and challenges, and Niro
is well equipped to handle both. While we used to
send Danish engineers and management abroad to
handle the buildup of our sister companies, today

the Niro group has success completing projects by
virtue of local collaborators.
Niro now works with Strategic Business Units (SBU),
where cross-collaboration within all essential industries
gives greater focus and flexibility to pursue
the same goals and create better results.
Engineering a difference
The initiatives we have underway clearly show that
our pioneering spirit is still alive and well, and we’re
firmly determined to continue to make a difference.
The world has a pressing need for greater capacity
for the processing of foodstuffs. We have extensive
experience within sanitary drying technology, and
in the future there will be opportunities for Niro,
especially in regions undergoing great development,
such as Asia and South America.
The global focus on the environment and energy is
expected to continue for many more years. Today
our flue gas cleaning technology for power plants
helps make the air cleaner many places in the world,
and Niro will play a great role here in the future
as well.
Niro’s capacity for innovation within the chemical,
food and pharma segments means that our expertise
will make a difference in the future, too.
To sum it up, our future looks just as exciting as
our past. If we maintain our ability to meet new
challenges and explore new ideas, if we continue
to emphasize innovation and individual initiatives,
and if we live up to our shared values, the next 75
years will bring a collection of articles that are
just as inspiring as this book.
Very best regards
Anders Wilhjelm
Michael Andersen
Niels Erik Olsen
Kristian Skaarup

Johan Ernst Nyrop: the man behind the success
By Christian Schwartzbach
It wasn’t written in the stars November 10, 1933 that the
company A/S Niro Atomizer, established at a meeting in a
lawyer’s office in Copenhagen, would be a prolonged success.
Around the globe, depression and unemployment prevailed
after World War I and the Great Stock Market Crash.
Denmark’s southern neighbor, Germany, was going through
political upheaval that would have catastrophic consequences
for the entire world. Yet there must have been a sense of
optimism and courage among the assembly of enterprising
men at their meeting in attorney Kaj Seth Oppenhejm’s office.
The key person was engineer Johan Ernst Nyrop. His technical
and scientific knowledge had resulted in a number of inventions
and patents, the business potential of which must
have given rise to optimism. A third important participant
was banker Erik Birger Christensen, who had both capital
available and faith in Nyrop.
Johan Ernst Nyrop was born in 1892 and earned his M.Sc.
in engineering in 1917. He was inventive, enterprising and
innovative. As a young man he and his friend Einar Dessau
experimented with broadcasting, among other things, and
he took out his first patent for the telephone telegraph in 1911.
8 | 9
A tough beginning
Nyrop participated in the establishment of the Danish
Medicinal and Chemical Company A/S in 1919. In the 1920s
he became interested in the spray drying of liquids, and in
1924 he established both a Danish company, A/S Niro, and
an English company, Nyrop Dehydrator, to make use of his
new knowledge. That same year, he got a patent for a rotating
atomizer.
The times were hardly favorable, and since finances were
not Nyrop’s strong suit, his efforts ended a few years later in
bankruptcy and great personal loss. During that same time,
Johan Ernst Nyrop cultivated his academic interests and
wrote articles and books about the catalytic effect of metallic
surfaces. In the early 1930s, he submitted a doctoral thesis
on this topic. The fact that this thesis was rejected, together
with the aforementioned bankruptcy, contributed to Nyrop
seeking new challenges.

Johan E. Nyrop, founder of A/S Niro Atomizer.
Niro’s building in Hellerup, Denmark,
in the 1940s.

Hjalmar Bang, Managing Director
from 1948-1971.
10 | 11
Indoor spray drying plant in wood
from the late 1940s.

Fortunately, he had influential friends who were able to see
the possibilities in his ideas and patents, and this resulted in
the establishment of A/S Niro Atomizer in 1933. Nyrop had
invaluable support in banker Erik Birger Christensen, who
had gotten to know Nyrop through projects about agricultural
products.
Birger Christensen became a decisive person in the history
of Niro Atomizer in many ways; during the early years mainly
as financer, and later as a member of the board of directors
with several important contributions. The first board had
attorney Kaj Seth Oppenhejm as chairperson.
On the road to success
Nyrop himself had to come to terms with a position as
consultant and shareholder. Because he previously had gone
bankrupt, he could no longer sit on the board. Nils Brorsen
worked the next five years as business manager. The total
share capital was DKK 12,000, of which Nyrop owned a third.
The deed of foundation carefully specifies that the consultant,
engineer Johan Ernst Nyrop, should only be paid by
the yield of his share of the share capital. Therefore, J.E.
Nyrop did not deposit cash capital, but solely patents and
rights.
There is very little to be found in the delivered documentation
about the course of the company during the early years.
Johan Ernst Nyrop was the driving force and succeeded in
securing orders for spray drying plants in Denmark and
abroad. The dried products were milk, blood, eggs, feedstuff
and soap.
The large industrial company Titan A/S on Tagensvej in
Copenhagen was from the beginning both a shareholder,
with a sixth part of the share capital, and a supplier. Titan
A/S made office space and workshops available and produced
atomizers according to Nyrop’s instructions. The fundamental
principle of Niro Atomizer from the beginning and for many
years was that they constructed the plants, but left the production
of the components to sub-suppliers.
Standard components were bought at specialist firms, while
specialized components were manufactured at different
workshops in Denmark according to Niro Atomizer’s designs.
For many years, the drying chambers were manufactured of
wood and coated with galvanized plates inside. Not until
later was stainless steel used. The technical side of the plants
was completely Nyrop’s responsibility. Despite his creativity,
he was quite conservative when it came to plant design.
Atomization was carried out, without exception, with the
rotating atomizer invented by Nyrop and drying air supplied
through a central pipe with a dispersion device on the tip.
Nyrop stuck to this design until his death in 1959. Without
doubt, the fact that they didn’t throw themselves into questionable
experiments prevented a number of difficulties for Niro
Atomizer; but when others took over technical management
after Nyrop’s death, the time had come for new developments.
History subsequently has also proven that it was necessary.
Change and progress
In 1938 Niro Atomizer got its own premises in Emdrupborg,
with room for a research facility. In 1942 a better-suited location
was found in a large villa on Aurehøjvej in Hellerup.
By 1943 Niro Atomizer had acquired roughly 150 orders for
spray drying plants. The palette of different products had
grown significantly. The company’s results fluctuated greatly
the first 12 years, and journal notes show significant additional
expenses in connection with troubleshooting of individual
plants. Concern about Johan Ernst Nyrop’s expense account
is also expressed.

After the end of World War II, a longer period of sizeable
profits began. This new period also included significant
organizational changes. The business manager until that
point, engineer K.J.S. Jensen, who had led Niro Atomizer
through the risky years, left the company in 1947 after
disagreements with the board. Shortly thereafter he founded
the company Anhydro.
Hjalmar Bang entered the company that same year as both
shareholder, member of the board and daily manager. From
a business standpoint, Bang was very experienced and dyna-
12 | 13
mic and initiated progress that Nyrop hardly could have
achieved. Director Bang became a legendary leader of Niro
Atomizer’s expansion until 1971, when he retired and replaced
K.S. Oppenhejm as chairperson.
Hjalmer Bang was a personality on the same level as founder
Johan Ernst Nyrop. Until Nyrop’s death in 1959, however,
Johan Ernst Nyrop remained the central character in Niro
Atomizer. He entered the board in 1955 and must have been
pleased with the progress his pri ncipal work created on the
global scene.
From left: J.E. Nyrop and Mrs. Nyrop,
K.S. Oppenheim and Harry Larsen,
later Managing Director of
A/S Niro Atomizer.

A/S Niro Atomizer’s first building at
Gladsaxevej 305 in Soeborg,
Denmark, in 1957.
A/S Niro Atomizer’s main building (today building B) from 1960.

The man who invented the wheel
Engineer Kaj Nielsen has been almost as important to the
development of Niro as its founder, Johan Ernst Nyrop. He was the
man who, among other things, invented a durable atomizer wheel
– later dubbed the KN-wheel.
14 | 15
Durable atomizer wheel for
drying products that cause
wear and tear.

KN are the initials of a very important person in the history
of Niro Atomizer. His name was Kaj Nielsen. In 1962, at only
age 36, engineer Kaj Nielsen, M.Sc., D. Tech., left the Danish
Soy Cake Factory to join Niro Atomizer as head of research
and development. His intended role was to replace Johan
Ernst Nyrop as technical anchorman. And he played that role
quite decisively. Johan Ernst Nyrop left an indelible stamp
on the companies he established. Nyrop Dehydrator got his
exact name, while A/S Niro got a name that obviously was
derived from the English pronunciation of the name.
By Christian Schwartzbach
It was probably Nyrop’s intention that the company reestablished
in 1933 be named A/S Niro. But a dispute with the
German Krupp Group got in the way. Krupp used the name
Niro as the brand for its line of stainless steel products. The
outcome was that the company was named A/S Niro Atomizer,
and it proved to be a durable name. Even in the year of its
75th anniversary, the old name is still remembered by many
people.
The durable atomizer wheel
Even though Johan Ernst Nyrop’s creativity continued for
many years, it never resulted in a single invention or component
for a spray drying plant carrying his name. With
only one exception, the same can be said for other creative
Niro Atomizer employees. The exception is the KN-wheel,
and it belongs to the period after Nyrop’s death. While
Johan Ernst Nyrop was quite conservative and with few
exceptions stuck to the design of the plants he had chosen
from the start, Kaj Nielsen was more open-minded and
initiated a number of new developments.
The area where Kaj Nielsen made his mark, and which still
carries his name, was spray drying of liquids containing
sharp, firm particles, which expose the rotating atomizer
wheel to great wear and abrasion. This doesn’t apply to
traditional products like milk, blood, eggs, feedstuff and
soap; but in the beginning of the 1940s and ‘50s, products
like ceramics, kaolin and tile clay became more prevalent.
This was a new challenge for Nyrop, which resulted in the
development of the first truly durable atomizer wheel,
which was patented in 1956 with Nyrop as co-inventor.
Kaj Nielsen, inventor of the durable
atomizer wheel, the KN-wheel.

Applications in many areas
This type of wheel was an improved version of the existing
type, since hard metal plates were placed on the wheel
where the wear occurred. This solution must have worked
satisfactorily for a period of time, because not until many
years later did a serious wear problem occur again – this
time on two plants delivered in 1962 to what was then
called Czechoslovakia. The product was tile clay for the
manufacturing of glazed wall and floor tiles. As one of his
first big assignments, Kaj Nielsen had to come up with a
solution, and the result was what later came to be called the
KN-wheel. Over the course of the following years, the invention
helped open new markets, initially in the former Soviet
Union, where the Russians had tried to build a number of
large spray drying plants for double superphosphate themselves,
but had failed because of wear and abrasion.
The atomizer wheel is the heart of a spray drying plant.
16 | 17
New atomizers from Niro Atomizer with KN-wheels solved
the problem. The next market to open up was the mining
industry. Spray drying was excellent to use for the drying of
mined nickel and copper concentrate. Significant orders were
secured in Australia, the U.S., South Africa, Botswana and the
Soviet Union. It is part of the story about Niro Atomizer and
Kaj Nielsen that the development of the large F-600 atomizer
plant began during his time, and that the combination of
this large atomizer, now the F-800 and F-1000, with the KNwheel
is the foundation for Niro’s leading position in another
important market: flue gas cleaning by the spray drying
method. Kaj Nielsen was appointed deputy director in 1965.
Unfortunately, he didn’t live to see all the success his efforts
led to. Kaj Nielsen died in 1970, at age 43. The few who still
remember him talk about KN with fondness.

A spray drying plant for copper and nickel concentrate.

Niro’s global network
Since the company’s founding in 1933, Niro’s family of subsidiary
and sister companies has grown to become large and closely knitted.
Johan Ernst Nyrop was very globally oriented and had already
prior to the establishment of A/S Niro Atomizer spent a great
deal of time in England. So when Johan Ernst Nyrop established
Niro in 1933, the intention was for the company in the
long run to have offices or agents in countries all around the
world. The first agents Niro used were the same agents and
contacts the old Danish machinery and hydro-extractor factory
Titan A/S used. Part of that story is the fact that Titan A/S,
besides producing Nyrop’s early atomizers in 1925, also made
office space and workshops available during Niro’s early years.
Therefore there was a natural and very close connection to
Titan A/S, and the fact that Johan Ernst Nyrop's brother Aage
was among the employees at Titan A/S did not harm the
connection.
In time, Niro established contacts itself, set up agencies and
provided licenses for foreign companies. Niro’s first subsidiary
was established by somewhat of a coincidence in France in
Brazil
18 | 19
1952-53. Niro’s former agent and licensee had violated the
contract, so in order to maintain Niro’s office and service in
the French market, they denounced the license and the agency
agreement and formed their own company in France. Now
the foundation was laid for foreign subsidiary companies,
which were established gradually as the need arose.
The reasons for the establishment of the subsidiary companies
are many: one was established because Niro had three agencies
in one country who got into a fight over customers. Some
companies were established because there suddenly was an
increase in the sale of a specific type of plant. And others were
established because it was impossible to import plants, which
therefore needed to be manufactured locally, or because the
traveling time would be too long if employees had to travel
from Denmark. Today, transportation times and technical
trade barriers are, after all, less than they used to be.
Australia
The photos in this
article show some
of our former
subsidiary
companies.

France
England New Zealand
By Sten Warburg

The American dream came true
The American part of Niro, Niro Inc., did not have the best odds for
success in the U.S. But hard work, great skills and a good understanding
of American culture have turned Niro Inc. into a success story.
Niro’s American sister company, Niro Inc., in Maryland.
20 | 21

Three plants in a row from the 1960s for the mining industry in the U.S.
By Jens Thousig Møller
When Niro set foot on American soil for the first time in
1946 to seek its fortune, like so many others, in the Promised
Land, it did not immediately seem as though it would be a
success. But hard work and a solid investment in good employees
and infrastructure eventually made the foundation
for the well-established company Niro Inc. From the start,
Niro entered a partnership with the company Nichols, which
was already an established name in the American market.
After ending the partnership in 1975, Niro Corporation, as it
was named back then, decided to go solo.
Niro Inc. has developed into a genuine American company
over the years, on the one hand benefitting from technical
support from Denmark, and on the other having understood
American business culture and customers. Today Niro Inc.
encompasses nearly 400 employees, many of whom have
more than 20 years of experience at Niro. Niro Inc. has expertise
that covers all of Niro’s business units within food
and dairy, pharma and the chemical industry. Competencies
include sales, plant design, project management and products,
and Niro Inc. has independent storage, workshop, research
and development facilities. Over the course of the years,
Niro Inc. has adjusted to the opportunities in changing
markets and with its initiatives contributed to Niro’s global
success.

Times change
22 | 23
Many of Niro’s employees travel around the world
as part of their job. Here the oldest member of
Niro’s senior club tells about one of his experiences
from when Europe was still divided into
East and West by the wall.

Times change, and I guess it’s a good thing – especially if the
changes mean better times. But it may be worth remembering
what it was like to work for Niro during the Cold War. In
the happy days of the 1950s, Europe was divided by the
so-called Iron Curtain into Eastern and Western Europe.
At some point we got an order for a plant for the drying of
sulphonated fat alcohol from a petrochemical factory in
what was then called Czechoslovakia – today Slovakia. The
factory was hidden in a beautiful wooded area in the mountains,
close to a little village called Dubova.
The legendary engineer Hoegsberg was responsible for the
assembling, and I was to start up the plant. This was my first
visit behind the Iron Curtain, and I was of course a bit excited
about how it would turn out. I arrived at Prague in the middle
of the day and was greeted by a representative of the company,
which had its head office in Prague. However, I was
not going to spend the night there, but was taking the night
train far eastwards. The representative provided me with
money and a train ticket and then hurried away. He didn’t
want to be seen with a westerner longer than necessary.
On the train I met two gentlemen from the factory who had
been briefed about my trip. They had the neighboring com-
Af Jørgen Wulff
partment and invited me to join them for some good Czech
beer. We discussed quite openly the conditions of the country,
which I should not have done. One of the gentlemen turned
out to be the chairman of the local communist cell. The next
morning I was greeted at the station by Hoegsberg. He told
me that for the first month he had been afraid to talk to
anyone at the factory about anything but professional stuff.
He had as his interpreter an old guy who had worked in
Canada as a lumberjack in his younger days, and therefore
spoke English well enough to be a good interpreter for us.
The village inn was undergoing renovation, but the owner
of the inn lived across the street in a villa. Hoegsberg had a
small room here that I took over after his departure. There
was a toilet, but no running water. I had to use my washing
water to flush the toilet. On Monday, I had to go with my
interpreter to the closest main city, where there was a police
station. I was going to get a visa. Over the following years,
during my trips to Eastern Europe, I realized that it wasn’t
enough to get an entry visa. No, you needed an exit visa as
well when you wanted to leave the country. Bureaucracy
with a vengeance.

The start up of the plant was not without problems. Something
was wrong when we couldn’t achieve the calculated dry air
quantity. A valve must have been mounted incorrectly, or
there had to be a blockage of the air supply pipe. But no,
that wasn’t the case. Then I disassembled the suction ventilator
and noted that the paddle wheel was laterally reversed. Now
the situation was desperate, but I succeeded in rebuilding
the suction ventilator, and then it worked.
As time went on everything worked, and the staff was able
to manage the operations. But they were not willing to let
me go, because then the plant became their own responsibility.
They dragged their feet, and I considered asking Niro to send
a telegram to the factory saying they needed me at home.
But suddenly they couldn’t get a connection to Denmark, or
so they claimed. But I could give them a message, and then
they would call Prague and ask them to deliver it. Of course
that was not possible, so I had to hang in there. Finally they
couldn’t keep me there anymore, and again I went to the police
station, where I got an exit visa.
Upon my departure from the factory, however, the manager
of the factory took it away from me, because he wanted
proof that I had actually been there. So I took the night
train back to Prague, from where I was flying back to
24 | 25
Copenhagen. As the time for my departure drew nearer, we
were called one by one into passport control. When it was
my turn I was in trouble, because I didn’t have an exit visa.
I suggested that they call the company in Prague to verify
my identity. They did try that, I think, but the office was
closed, since it was past four o’clock. We argued in English,
German and the small amount of Czech that I knew, but it
didn’t do me any good. I was held back, while the other
passengers were attended to.
I realized that I would be put in jail without the possibility
of notifying Denmark. I was hoping that the infamous exit
visa could be provided by the next day, so that I could get
out of the Iron Curtain. But then everything was suddenly
alright. I was one big question mark, but the explanation
was easy. The commissar was tired of arguing and had left
the room, and then the passport officer was not afraid to
give me the precious stamp in my passport. It was an unpleasant
event, and later that evening when I was home in
my garden in Virum, I enjoyed the freedom. I had come to
realize how good it was to live on the western side of the
Iron Curtain. And as a little ironic postscript: today you
can travel to 24 Schengen countries without a passport. Yes,
times do change.

From Lilliput to world player By Christian Schwartzbach
Niro started out as a Danish corporation with DKK 12,000 in
capital. Today it is a world leader within the global market for
spray drying plants.
When Niro was established as the corporation A/S Niro Ato -
mizer in 1933, the four shareholders contributed a modest
DKK 12,000 in total. The shares were divided in this way:
J.E. Nyrop and wife, DKK 4,400; Titan A/S, DKK 2,000; the
clients of K.S. Oppenhejm, DKK 3,600; and Dr. Viggo Schmidt
and wife, DKK 2,000.
Titan A/S was only a minor shareholder, even though the
company as a supplier of atomizers clearly had an interest
in Niro. There is reason to believe that Paul Hannover, the
director of Titan A/S, was not interested in getting personally
involved in the risky project.
Under the name “the clients of K.S. Openhejm” was the investment
company Kipa, which was owned by Erik Birger Christensen.
Dr. Viggo Schmidt was a well-known chief physician
at that time and a friend of Johan Ernst Nyrop. As is apparent,
the group of investors was limited and willing to take a risk.
From 12,000 to 1 million
Over the next 25 years, the share capital in A/S Niro Atomizer
increased manifold. A statement from 1958 shows that Niro’s
shareholders had stock with the value of DKK 1 million. The
value of the company had risen significantly since the company’s
founding in 1933. The big financial backers were Erik
Birger Christensen, Hjalmar Bang and Nichols Engineering,
Niro’s partner on the American market.
In 1968 director H. Brüniche-Olsen joined the board, after
the Danish Sugar Factories (DSF) had acquired a larger block
of shares. Their block of shares was expanded in 1974, when
Niro Inc. was established, and Nichols sold their shares.
Brünich-Olsen became chairman of the board in 1978, when
DSF took over all shares, which at that time had a value of
DKK 45 million. Niro Atomizer became a subsidiary of DSF.
In 1989 DSF, the Distilleries and Danisco merged into one
company under the name Danisco A/S. Niro Atomizer became
a subsidiary of Danisco and changed its name to Niro A/S.
In 1993 Niro was sold to the German industrial enterprise GEA
in Bochum, which at that time was owned by the Happel
family and headed by Dr. Otto Happel. At that point, share
capital in Niro was roughly DKK 150 million. The strategic reason
behind the purchase was, according to Volker Hannemann,
head of GEA, that GEA needed the international experience
that Niro had, in addition to its leading position on the world
market for spray drying. Volker Hannemann became the
chairman of Niro’s board in the period 1993-94, and today
Niro has a central position in the GEA organization.
The head office of the GEA Group in Bochum, Germany.

A partner on many fronts
Niro has been part of the production of more everyday products than most
end-users probably know – because many products today have to be
long-lasting, cheap to transport and still maintain a high level of quality.
Now serving: 10 good reasons why our customers use Niro’s technology.
In 2001-2002, global coffee production constituted
more than 6.6 billion tons of green beans.
This corresponds to one trillion cups of coffee.
26 | 27
About 10 billion tons of milk powder were
produced around the world in 2007. Spray
drying of milk extends the shelf life and
reduces transportation costs.

The red berries in cornflakes are dried in a Niro freeze dryer.
Nearly all soups and sauces in powder form are spray dried.
By Harald Klementsen

The WHO estimates that up to 50 percent of the vaccines given in
third-world countries have no effect, because they’re not stored in
a cool place. By removing the water through spray drying, storage in
a refrigerator becomes unnecessary.
28 | 29
The blue color in a pair of jeans has
been through a spray dryer.
The basis for the white color in paint is
spray dried titanium dioxide.

A lot of medication does not taste good – for example, vitamin pills for adults.
In the spray drying process it is possible to hide the unpleasant taste by
“coating” – that is, covering the pill with a substance that tastes good.

The raw material that is used all over the world for the manufacturing
of plastic has been through a spray or fluid bed dryer.
30 | 31

Tools made of hard metal, like a drill, are typically
produced with spray dried wolfram carbide.

Small department, great success
Niro’s Small Scale Plants department,
which sells laboratory-sized spray
drying plants, has sold more than
3,000 of the two most popular plants
since 1968.
PRODUCTION MINOR spray dryer, one of Niro’s best-selling pilot plants.
32 | 33
November 14, 2002 was a big day for the Small Scale Plants
department (SSP) at Niro. This was the day the department
could celebrate the sale of MOBILE MINOR plant No.
2,000, which was sold to an English company. The plant was
placed in Niro’s reception area on January 6, 2003, and the
next morning it was handed over to the customer.
MOBILE MINOR, which is a laboratory-sized spray drying
plant on wheels, was first introduced in 1948 and is actually
older than its department, SSP. SSP is a continuation of the
original department, the PM department, which was established
in 1968 when the sales, order and service functions
for small drying plants were unified. SSP delivers plants to
all the industries that Niro covers, and its primary customers
are educational institutions and development departments
in companies. The plants are used to develop new products,
for small-scale production, and to manufacture product
samples for the companies’ own clients.
The MOBILE MINOR spray dryer and the PRODUCTION
MINOR spray dryer are SSP’s greatest successes. In a
spray drying context, both plants are capable of producing
only relatively small amounts of end product. The MOBILE
MINOR spray dryer is able to dry a few kilos of product
per hour, while the PRODUCTION MINOR has the capacity
to produce up to 32 kilos. In comparison, a number of the
big milk and coffee spray drying plants produce several
tons per hour. The latter is from the end of the 1950s, and
more than 1,000 PRODUCTION MINOR spray dryers have
been sold. Niro’s Pharma Division originally began as part
of the SSP department about 20 years ago, and at that time
was only a small part of SSP. Later, sales to the pharmaceutical
industry became so significant that an independent Pharma
Division (the H-Division) was established. But that’s another
story.

MOBILE MINOR number 2,000 – sold in 2002.
By Per Puggaard and Gunnar Petersen

The challenges of drying milk
Born on a Friday the 13th and fled from the communist regime
with his family on October 13, 1968 at 1300 hours was perhaps
not the most optimistic basis for a great career as head of Niro’s
milk development department. But Jan Pisecký from the Czech
Republic had other plans.
With a background as a chemical engineer from the Technical
University of Prague and a Ph.D. degree thereafter, Jan Pisecký
became head of the Czech Dairy Research Institute – a position
which for political reasons was intolerable to him. Until
1968 there had not been many development projects at Niro
for milk powder spray plants, but after Jan Piceský was
hired, things started to happen.
The first challenge for Niro was to make a whole milk powder,
which contains milk fat, soluble in cold water.
Some of the milk fat is forced out onto the surface of the
powder particles, which makes the particles water-repellent
– especially when the water is cold. One of the requirements
was that only “natural ingredients” which the milk already
contained were allowed to be added. This sounded easy, but
it took more than a year for two employees to take the process
from the laboratory to an industrial plant that could produce
a whole milk powder that was cold water-soluble.
The task was solved by spraying a lecithin solution on the
surface of the milk powder particles – a process that customers
lined up to buy.
34 | 35
Need for product quality among customers
Some of the development projects were inspired by the need
to solve customers’ problems with product quality. The
biggest problem was the density of the milk powder. Almost
all of Niro’s milk plants were based on atomization of the
fluid milk concentrate into small particles with a rotating
ato mizer; that is, a component that converts the liquid into
particles, which are then dried to powder.
This resulted in a lighter powder than the one our competitors
– especially from the U.S. and Japan – could produce. Not
even Niro’s famous, patented “milk wheel” was able to solve
the problem of product quality. During the energy crisis in
the 1970s, when saving energy was a requirement, plants
able to dry the powder in two steps were developed, since it
is cheaper to remove the residual moisture in a vibrating
after-dryer – called a VIBRO-FLUIDIZER ® – compared to a
spray drying plant.
Two-step drying, as it was called, provided better drying
economy but also a heavier powder. With Niro’s high-pressure
nozzles the powder became even heavier, and Niro was ahead
of the competition again. But the development activities
didn’t stop there. Customers required even better drying
economy and higher quality drying, and showed interest

Jan Pisecký’s book, “Handbook of Milk
Powder Manufacture,” from 1997.
One of the world’s biggest spray drying plants
for whole milk powder, a Multi-Stage Dryer
– MSD, was developed by Jan Pisecký.
By Vagn Westergaard

36 | 37
An “instantizer,” here a VIBRO-FLUIDIZER at a modern milk
powder factory in Vimmerby, Sweden.

in drying new products that couldn’t be dried by existing
plants because of their high fat content. Thus a completely
new plant concept was born. The MSD plant (Multi-Stage
Dryer) was born in 1976. The ingenious aspect of this multiple
step drying plant was the fact that a fluid bed was mounted
in the base of the drying chamber; the moist powder from
the drying chamber was caught by the dry powder in the fluid
bed, preventing deposits in the drying chamber. It also became
possible to dry products with a high fat content. Niro had once
again positioned itself as the leading supplier of modern spray
drying equipment, and the customers were standing in line.
The COMPACT DRYER plant is born
Niro management was not completely satisfied, however; the
new wave of development in the latter half of the 1970s meant
that more and more plants were delivered with high-pressure
nozzles and not with the rotating atomizer that Niro was
famous for. They had to invent a plant with a rotating atomizer
and a static fluid bed. The solution became an old-fashioned,
conventional plant where the conical bottom of the drying
chamber was cut off and replaced by a ring-shaped static
fluid bed.
The COMPACT DRYER plant was born, and it became the
basis for the rebuilding of many old plants, where the result
in part was improved production capacity and at the same
time an improved product in every way. On top of that came
energy savings of 20 percent per kilo of produced powder.
Many of Jan Pisecký’s “disciples” are still working on the
development of Niro’s milk plants, highly inspired by him,
along with their own ideas and new opportunities using advanced
computer technology. That still makes Niro’s plants
leading as far as technology, design and product quality are
concerned.
Operators in the control room.

In cowboy country
Jens Thousig Moeller was one of the Danish employees who
became part of Niro’s success in America. Here he recounts
his experiences stationed in the U.S. in the 1970s.
The year was 1974, with the energy crisis and car-free Sundays.
After six good years in the development department and
research laboratory at Niro, it was time for a change. Suddenly
there was an exciting opportunity: working in another country,
moving with my family to an unfamiliar place – to the land
of cowboys and Indians, no less. Rent out the house, pack the
moving boxes and buy a house in beautiful Maryland, in the
newly developed and energetic city of Columbia, which was
just the right place for the office. It became a wonderful “
pioneer camp” with team spirit, long days with interesting
projects and enthusiasm – because the colonization had to
succeed – which also included the growing crowd of natives
involved, who turned out to be very friendly and talented.
The first temporary camp was traded for a big and beautiful
white castle with many individual rooms (offices), lots of
cupboard space (spare parts storage), large, modern reception
facilities (test station) and a fine dining room (canteen). The
Danes ate their flat, homemade rye bread lunches while the
natives looked on in astonishment, munching on their big,
soft, store-bought sandwiches with mayonnaise and pickles.
Yes, it was a culture clash that certainly could cause the laughter
to spread. As newcomers we tried to be very resourceful;
communication took place via letters or telefaxes that were
38 | 39
difficult to understand, because phoning out of the country
was very expensive back then. However, sometimes we were
paid a visit by headquarters when the local merit badges were
not adequate – and then we got supplies of herring and real
rye bread. We learned about the natives’ institutions, like
kindergartens and schools, where our children were very well
treated – even though some of the teachers had serious doubts
about the intelligence of our children, since they didn’t speak
the local language very well.
With wonderful memories and the belief that we’d gained a
bit of insight into the way other people think, we headed home
to Denmark. Here, there were still intense discussions about
Christiania, the Great Belt Bridge and the weather, which sometimes
require extra effort to stay on top of. Three years had
gone by quickly, with all the good experiences and acquaintances
that we were looking forward to telling people at home
about, but which at the same time was complicated by the
domestic Vietnam syndrome. Still, it was nice to return to
our motherland, and it didn’t diminish our experience of a
fantastic stay in a wonderful U.S. and the belief that the
success of Niro Inc. was well on the way.

By Jens Thousig Møller
A spray drying plant for Kaolin in the U.S.

Infant formula: a vital alternative
One of Niro’s biggest markets is the delivery of drying plants
for the production of infant formula. We have delivered plants
to all of the world’s biggest infant formula manufacturers.
Infant formula plant in the East.
40 | 41

For those who have never tried it, it looks so easy – this
thing with babies and nursing. In books and movies it’s
often portrayed as though the woman just puts the baby to
the breast, and then everything else happens naturally. But
it’s not always that easy. The woman may lack milk, the
child may be allergic to the breast milk, or a busy life can
make it impossible for the mother always to be physically
available to nurse her child.
That’s why it’s always been necessary to find alternatives
that could give infants vital nourishment if their mother was
not able to produce milk herself or had died in childbirth.
During the 19th century, scientists started experimenting
with production of infant formula. Today, the production and
marketing of infant formula is dominated by multinational
companies such as Nestlé, Wyeth, Abbott and Nutricia. They
all use Niro as their supplier of equipment to manufacture
the finished powder.
Manufacturing infant formula
The raw material used is mixed in big tanks to get a composition
of the final product that is as close to breast milk as
possible. Based on regular milk, many different ingredients
are added, such as vitamins, essential amino acids, special
oils, extra sugar and different proteins, either in liquid or
powder form.
By Vagn Westergaard
After mixing, the product is heat-treated to ensure a low
content of bacteria before it is homogenized, evaporated
and dried.
To design and manufacture an entire process line, Niro works
with many of our sister companies in GEA’s Processing Division.
Our strength is that we listen to customers concerning
how and in what order they want the different raw materials
mixed. No two infant formulas are exactly the same. When
it comes to evaporation and drying, customers listen to Niro
because our technology is world-leading. The most important
thing for the baby is that it gets the right amount of nutrition,
and that the formula is soluble in water without generating
lumps in the bottom of the baby’s bottle or leaving small,
undissolved particles that block up the holes in the nipple.
As the amount of nutrition in the powder is stated in grams
but often measured with a measuring cup, it is important
that the density of the powder is adjustable in the drying
process so that it is always the same.

Great emphasis on hygiene
Niro places great emphasis on delivering plants with a high
hygienic standard, which is vital for babies. Bacteria and
contamination control is in focus, and the spray drying
plants live up to stringent health and safety requirements.
The density is primarily regulated by sending all the small
particles formed during the drying process back through
the process, so that they are pasted together with the larger
particles in order to form an agglomerate. But since agglo -
merates are the main cause of undissolved particles, Niro
has to master the agglomeration process. That Niro has
done so is demonstrated by the fact that Niro has about 80
percent of the world market for sales of plants for formula
production.
About infant formula
• Infant formula makes up 45 percent of the market for
food for babies.
• The biggest markets for infant formula are India, China
and the Far East.
• It is expected that in 2010, Asia will make up half of the
global market for infant formula.
42 | 43
Evaporator for milk.

Practical problem cracker By Vagn Westergaard and Thorvald Ullum
The amazing tool Computational
Fluid Dynamics (CFD) has saved
time, money and headaches for both
Niro and our customers.
For a number of years, a customer in Asia had lived with a
problem that seemed almost impossible to solve. They had
bought a Niro spray drying plant for the manufacture of infant
formula, but there was the problem that wet product stuck
to the walls of the chamber. This meant the loss of a great
deal of the product, a needless waste of time and an increased
risk of fire in the chamber.
The employees at Niro in charge of the plant discussed what
could be done. One solution could be to carry out experiments
on this plant to find a possible solution to the problem. This
would have been incredibly expensive and time-consuming
and very annoying for the customer. Instead they chose to
use Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). CFD gives the user
the opportunity to test possible solutions faster and more
inexpensively by means of a computer instead of real, physical
tests. CFD simulations are carried out at Niro by CFD specialists,
and the results are evaluated with process technologists
who have extensive practical experience.
With the help of CFD, the problem with the infant formula
plant was solved with great success. A process technologist and
a CFD specialist worked together closely on the remodeling of
the plant, which translated into a financial gain for the customer
of approximately DKK 3 million a year. In addition,
solving the case has had great significance for the relationship
between the customer and Niro.
With CFD it is possible to study the flow of liquids and gasses.
A mathematical model consisting of several million very complex
equations is built, which describes the physical system
one wants to study. When the model is complete and implemented,
the computer is able to predict the movement of
liquids and gasses, transport of heat and mass, loss of pressure,
particle movement and drying.
With CFD it is therefore possible to build a virtual model of
a system and expose it to realistic physics and chemistry.
The credibility of the model’s predictions is strongly dependent
upon the input of the user as well as powerful computers
for calculation, which is why Niro uses many resources on
validating and developing the whole CFD environment.
Among other things, Niro has developed an experimental
method to determine the matter-specific drying velocities
that are part of the CFD simulations of a spray drying chamber.
Outside of Niro, CFD is used within many different areas such
as meteorology, optimization of ship, airplane and car design,
as well as within the whole chemical and process technology
industry etc. Today, 3-4 Niro employees work with CFD full
time. CFD is extensively used for problem-solving and design
optimization in almost all of Niro’s components. The results
are so reliable that Niro can design plants that are smaller
and more efficient than before – a significant step in the effort
to remain out front and competitive.

How Niro stacks up in the environment
The Studstrup plant – one of two Danish
power plants using Niro SDA technology.
44 | 45

Flue gas cleaning is not a traditional business area for
Niro, but being different doesn’t preclude success.
A request from the Fiat factories in Torino for a plant that
could remove sulphur compounds, SO2, from the flue gas
emitted by a coal-fired power station in 1975 was the start of
one of Niro’s most extraordinary adventures.
New national and international requirements to reduce airborne
pollution had resulted in power plants, among others,
having to reduce their sulphur discharge. As a consequence
of Fiat’s request, Niro looked into the possibility of using a
traditional Niro spray dryer as a combined drying and absorption
chamber. The idea was to use the hot flue gas in a
spray dryer to dry a slurry of lime, which would also neutralize
the acidic sulphur compounds in the flue gas. It worked
and Niro’s Spray Drying Absorption (SDA) process was born.
Since Niro saw significant market potential in flue gas
cleaning, a large development project was started which,
among other things, involved a pilot plant being placed at
a power station in Fergus Falls in the U.S. Niro employees
By Niels Jacobsen
from all over the world staffed the pilot plant, which soon
produced large amounts of data. At the same time, development
work continued in Denmark, and the application was
expanded to also include being able to clean flue gas from
waste incineration plants. The big breakthrough came in
1978, with the first commercial order of an SDA plant for an
American power station, Antelope Valley.
A flue gas cleaning plant of this magnitude meant that the
spray dryers were much bigger than those Niro had ever
built. Handling the large amount of flue gas required four
Spray Drying Absorbers, plus one in reserve – each 14 meters
in diameter. To ensure that this first plant became a success,
the decision was made to build a pilot plant with a 14-meterlarge
absorber in Minneapolis, Minnesota in the U.S. The
plant was built as quickly as possible, and just before Christmas
in 1980, flue gas was desulphurized for the first time
with a full-scale industrial Niro SDA plant.

An adventure with a future
After this the orders came in a steady flow from both
Germany and the U.S., and Niro built large organizations in
both the U.S. and Denmark to handle the extensive flue gas
orders. In 1986 the business strategy in the area was changed
drastically; instead of being the supplier of complete flue
gas cleaning plants, Niro took one step back and entered
into license agreements instead, so that other companies
would now build Niro SDA plants. Niro maintained the role
as technical, sales and marketing advisor. The flue gas group
shrunk to a handful of employees, but the prospect of new
markets in China, among others, resulted in more resources
being provided, and the flue gas group successfully entered
the Chinese, Korean and South American markets.
The process and the plant components involved have been
refined and the capacity increased over the years. Thus it is
almost possible to obtain the same capacity as in Antelope
Valley with one Spray Dryer Absorber with a diameter of
over 20 meters, compared to the original 14 meters. The
biggest atomizers are the F-1000, which can handle roughly
120 tons of lime slurry per hour. Process improvements mean
that today it is possible to clean the fluid gas almost 100%.
Smoke and Muck, as the flue gas area has been called,
can be compared to the ugly duckling in Hans Christian
Andersen’s fairy tale. We don’t really fit into Niro’s normal
business areas, nor do we run the business the same way –
but when we look at our reflection on Niro’s bottom line,
the view is pretty good.
46 | 47
A view from the top floor of a spray absorption plant (14 meters in diameter) in
the Czech Republic. A reserve plant F 800 is ready for replacement, at the top
right of the picture.

The power plant Antelope Valley in the U.S.,
from where Niro got its first order for an SDA plant in 1978.

The coffee chronicle
Around the world, more than a trillion cups of coffee are
consumed every year. But how many people really know
the story behind the popular drink?
The word coffee gives many impressions and associations.
A literature critic would probably think of Karen Blixen’s
biographical novel Out of Africa, which has a coffee plantation
as the setting for her tragic love story. A farmer would perhaps
look at it as a very demanding and troublesome bush with a
relatively expensive crop. And a Niro engineer would probably
immediately think of big, rust-free production plants, in
which one can turn green coffee beans into instant coffee.
But what is coffee really? Coffee is a bush that originally
grew in the highlands of the Horn of Africa and the Arabic
peninsula. The coffee bush bears fruit (berries), each of
which contains two stones or beans (normally called green
beans). As the berries often are picked by very simple means,
and the handling thereafter (where the flesh is removed from
the green beans) often is very rough, the result is broken beans,
which cannot be sold as grade A quality. These beans usually
aren’t bad as far as taste goes, so instead of using the beans
as fuel, there’s the possibility of using them and increasing
their value by producing instant coffee. In this way, coffee
farmers also get the full benefit of their crop.
48 | 49
Coffee during the war
Instant coffee has been known since 1909, but it wasn’t until
the 1940s, during World War II, that larger amounts of instant
coffee were produced and supplied to the American and
English troops. Instant coffee was manufactured with very
doubtful profitability and quality (both taste and appearance
could have been much better), but it served the purpose of
soldiers being able to get coffee quickly, and it didn’t take a
lot of effort to make coffee on the front line.
The first real industrial spray drying plant for the production
of instant coffee of reasonable quality was built in the years
1950-1952. Niro was at the forefront and among the pioneers
in Brazil. In 1947, Niro was able to offer and design industrial
plants and matching pilot tests with extraction and spray
drying for the first time. The first big boom in deliveries of
extraction and spray drying plants came in the 1960s. In
1965, the first freeze-drying plants also were delivered, and
the former Atlas freeze-drying division (which today is a
completely integrated part of Niro), was the frontrunner.

By Sten Warburg

Niro freeze drying plant Atlas, type RAY. FSD from the coffee factory HACO in Switzerland.
Niro freeze drying plant Atlas, type CONRAD.
50 | 51

How do you make instant coffee?
But then how do you make instant coffee? Roughly speaking,
the production of instant coffee starts the same way as at
home in the kitchen. One grinds the roasted coffee beans
and lets boiling water seep through them. Then the percolated
water is dried out of the liquid coffee (the extract), and now
one has instant coffee. Between the extraction step and the
drying step another step can be inserted, where the aromatic
content is optimized and the extract concentrated. The extraction,
the evaporation and the drying of coffee in a Niro
plant is today executed in such a way that the quality is on
the same level as freshly brewed coffee from newly roasted
beans. Any differences in taste between instant coffee and
fresh coffee are therefore today more a question of choice of
beans and the desire for profit, which all comes down to the
question of how much we want to pay for the product. Since
1947, where the first small steps were taken towards extraction
and spray drying of coffee, Niro has constantly sought to
improve the spray drying process, and today Niro is the
world’s leading supplier of equipment for instant coffee plants.
Through purchases, working with knowledge databases and
development, Niro today is able to offer complete turnkey
coffee plants for freeze-dried, spray dried and agglomerated
instant coffee – plants covering everything from reception
of the green beans through the production of instant coffee,
packed in glass and palletized, ready for shipment. Why have
instant coffee at all today? Because it is easy and convenient
to make a quick cup, it is easy to use in coffee machines
(there are no coffee grounds to dispose of), the shelf-life is
long, and it weighs and takes up very little space compared
to coffee beans.
Cool coffee facts
• There are three main types of coffee: Arabica, Robusta
and Liberica.
• Arabica and Robusta make up about 98 percent of the
coffee sold.
• The total world production of coffee beans varies from
year to year; it is between 6.5-7 million tons per year,
which corresponds to more than one trillion cups of coffee.
• Approximately 20 percent of the total coffee production
is used to produce instant coffee.
• Niro has delivered more than 180 coffee production
plants all over the world.
The top part of a coffee extractor.

Plastic is used everywhere
Niro delivers drying plants for polymers, which are used
in plastic toys, packaging and construction materials.
CONTACT FLUIDIZER for drying of the polymer HDPE in Poland.
52 | 53

NOZZLE TOWER spray dryer for production
of the polymer Polyacrylonitrile in
the Netherlands.
By Henrik Bender Mortensen and Claus Lemb
When the kids play with balls or LEGO ® blocks, Niro has
probably been in the game. And when Dad plays handyman
and uses electrical cables or puts up gutters, or Mom wipes
down the deck chairs, Niro might also have been part of the
process. LEGO ® blocks, electric cables, gutters and plastic
garden furniture consist of polymers, which can have been
dried in a Niro plant.
There are many different polymers. Polymers are used in
the fashion industry for shoes and belts, in kitchenware such
as ladles and mixing bowls, as well as in packaging and white
glue. Already in the early 1950s, Niro started selling spray
drying plants to the part of the PVC business that produces
soft toys and electrical cables, among other things. Good
connections helped Niro get orders for a number of plants,
and in the early 1960s Niro developed flash and fluid bed
drying plants for a type of PVC used among other things for
gutters and garden furniture.
In the early 1970s the market changed, so that the type of
PVC used in soft toys and cable insulation became by far
the biggest part of the market. At that time Niro had sold a
number of flash fluid bed plants and about 100 spray drying
plants. The focus was switched, and since then Niro has sold
roughly 200 flash and fluid bed plants and more than 100
spray drying plants.
The first PVC plant was able to produce four tons of product
per hour, while the plants that Niro delivers today are able
to produce more than 40 tons of product per hour. During
the 1980s and ‘90s, the polymer market ran out of steam.
But since 1998, Niro has sold more than 70 drying plants for
the production of polymers, of which many large ones are
sold especially to the Chinese market.

Niro strikes while the iron is hot
Niro has created a unique position for itself as the leading supplier
of spray drying plants for the production of hard metal powders.
Niro has always had many irons in the fire – also when it
comes to the spray drying of hard metals, which are used
within the mining and tooling industries. When a smith
stands at the lathe to work metal into tools, for example, he
uses a cutting flat. The cutting flat is a tool that is used in a
lathe to work on the metal object one wants to shape into
another defined form. Hard metals are characterized by having
great strength and hardness and are very suitable for making
cutting flats for shaping metal and for mining equipment.
Cutting flats and tools of hard metal are typically processed
by pressing the hard metal powder into the desired object.
The particle size of the hard metal powder being pressed
greatly influences the physical qualities one can obtain. A
fine hard metal powder typically has greater hardness and
resistance against wear in the finished cutting flat. Niro’s
spray drying plants have proven especially suitable for obtaining
a well-defined particle size of the hard metal powder.
A unique position in the hard metal market
Today Niro has a unique position within the spray drying of
hard metals, and during the last 40 years has delivered more
than 120 spray drying plants for hard metals. The hard metal,
cobalt and binding material are initially ground in a liquid
for many hours until the right particle size is obtained.
Then the mixture, called the hard metal feed, is dried in the
spray drying plant. Hard metals are also used for the coating
of metals, which thereby achieve greater mechanical strength.
This means that the metal on a drill or saw, for example, can
54 | 55
be coated with a thin layer of hard metal, which gives it a
very strong surface and thereby makes it more resistant to
wear and tear.
The use of hard metals is growing steadily. In 1930, the world’s
total use of hard metals was 10 tons per year –1,000 tons a
year at the beginning of the 1940s, and 10,000 tons a year at
the beginning of the 1960s. Today approximately 50,000
tons of hard metals are produced per year. Hard metals are
so valuable that a very large part of the used cutting flats is
collected by the hard metal companies and reused for the
production of new cutting flats.
About hard metal
• Hard metals have different names, such as tungsten or
wolfram, and the latter is not randomly named. Wolfram
is Scottish and means wolf froth, which refers to the
metal being so hard to dig out of the ground that back in
the old days it simply “ate” the shovels, like a wolf consumes
a sheep.
• Wolfram was first isolated in 1781 by the Swedish
pharmacist Carl Wilhelm Scheele.
• In 1909 an American, W.D. Coolidge, succeeded in using
metallic wolfram for filaments that could be used in
incandescent lamps.
• Wolfram can be found in several countries, while China
has approximately 60 percent of the known wolfram
reserves.

A Niro HC 600 plant for hard metals.
By Allan Juel Pedersen
A stainless steel object is being worked up on a lathe.
Right beneath the white coolant is the cutting roll,
utting into the steel.

Little brother standing on his own two feet
Niro’s youngest division, the Pharma Division, became an
independent part of GEA Pharma Systems on January 1, 2008.
In 2007, GEA decided to create an independent Pharma Division
(H-Division) within GEA. The division was established
by transferring the former companies in Niro Pharma Systems
from the P-Division in GEA into the newly established H-Division.
With the establishment of the Pharma Division, it was
natural to transfer Niro’s own Pharma Division.
Niro’s Pharma Division is one of the newer Niro success stories.
Not until the latter 1990s did pharmaceutical companies
seriously start demanding spray drying plants for the drying
of medicine. This new opportunity was clearly identified
and led in 2000 to the establishment of a dedicated Pharma
Division at Niro.
During the last 10 years, the pharmaceutical industry has
found it more and more difficult to find promising new drugs
– the “easy” products have been found and are already on the
market. In addition, the pressure on big pharmaceutical companies
has been further increased, as patents on their main
products expire and manufacturers of generic drugs are
able to start production.
The pharmaceutical industry spends vast amounts on research
and development – typically between 10 and 30 percent of
56 | 57
their business. Unfortunately, the new drugs being discovered
are predominantly very difficult to turn into commercial
products. Typical problems are the dosage and resident time
in the body necessary to obtain the desired effect.
However, this is an area where we can use one of the big advantages
of spray drying – for example by making a powder
as fine as tobacco smoke for inhalation.
The special demands on production plants for the pharmaceutical
industry – partly from customers and partly from
the authorities – also brought about the need for a dedicated
line of spray dryers to meet those demands. Such a line
was developed and designed in 2000/01 and is called the
PHARMASD line.
Establishment of test facility led to great success
In 2001 it was decided to establish a test facility where it was
possible to test the production of drugs. Niro wanted to enter
into a partnership with the pharma industry regarding the
development and testing of new drugs as well as meet the
pharma industry’s need for studies in connection with the
development of new drugs.

By Svenn Ryberg
Niro’s Pharma test center in Gladsaxe, Denmark.

A “clean room” at Niro’s Pharma test center in Gladsaxe, Denmark.
58 | 59

The project was approved and initiated in 2003. However, a
significant change in the conditions of the project occurred
at the end of 2003. During this period Niro had intensive
discussions with a large pharmaceutical company concerning
a new and promising drug for the treatment of AIDS. They
needed a spray drying plant that was approved by the authorities,
since they wanted to examine the drug’s effect on
human beings. The discussions led to an agreement about
production of the product, and thereby the plant was not to
be “similar” anymore, but to meet all of the authorities’
demands regarding production of drugs.
The “clean room” – with the bottom of the spray drying chamber.
The operator of the plant can be seen through the window
on the left.
The project was carried out with much participation by our
customer and under a tight deadline. The time schedule
held, and on November 26, 2004 we received approval from
the Danish Medicines Agency. The first product was produced
in December that same year. Over the following two years,
Niro produced significant quantities for the customer, whose
product was approved for commercial sale this year. All
things considered, a success story!
Tanks and high pressure pumps for preparation of the fluid product.

About development and technological milestones
Demand for better products
The need for more simple plants is slowly
decreasing from the start of the 1960s. Customers
want specially designed plants that can
deliver improved powder properties such as
fast and completely dissolving milk and infant
formula products, coffee and dyestuffs. The
development is towards plants combining
spray drying and fluid bed techniques.
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Flue gas
Requirements for flue gas cleaning are increased
in the 1980s, and plants for chemical waste
must be able to handle temperatures over
1,000° C. Today, plants for power stations
must be able to handle flue gas amounts of
over 2 billion kilos per hour and therefore
grow into gigantic dimensions: over 20 meters
in diameter and up to 40-60 meters tall.
Energy consumption
The energy crisis in the early 1970s increases
the need for heat recovery systems and plant
types with lower energy consumption. Niro’s
SWIRL FLUIDIZER is introduced as an alternative
to traditional plants, since the water
evaporation and thus the energy consumption
per kilo product is substantially lower.
New types of plants and big plants
During the 1960s and 1970s, the new polymers
in particular are dried in cylindrically shaped
fluid bed plants. Since then, the development
has been towards box-shaped plants with encapsulated
heating elements. This type of plant
can be the size of a small house and is able to
dry up to 40-100 tons of powder per hour. The
plants are used in particular for the drying of
polymers and soda. The latter is used within
the building industry, in glass production
and, for example, in detergents.
Plant tightness and cleanliness
In the 1960s spray drying of products
that because of toxicity or corrosive
properties present special demands
on plants’ tightness is begun. Other
products can make demands regarding
extreme cleanliness. Niro develops
plants that are completely closed and
thus protect both the product and the
surroundings.

Greater environmental demands are obeyed
In the course of the 1980s, a development
towards increased protection of the environment
and thereby better cleaning of the exhaust
air from Niro’s plants is begun. Wet cleaning
methods are used in the beginning, but new
demands on water quality make the transition to
dry cleaning practical. An independent bag filter
technology is developed by Niro and becomes
an important part of the delivery program.
Increased competition
Globalization, which starts in the early
1990’s, brings increased competition,
which is countered by further standardization
of components and plant concepts.
With increased interest in Niro’s plants,
especially from the Far East and China,
local manufacturing starts to further
reduce costs.
Reduction of dust
From the 1980s, the demand by product manufacturers
for reduced dust when handling
powder increases. Niro’s customers want
plants that manufacture less dusty products.
Af Jens Thousig Møller
This applies to a wide spectrum of powders,
such as dyestuffs for textiles, chemicals for
agriculture and wine growing, and additives
to rubber in shoes and car tires etc.

New demands from customers and new
types of plants
To meet customers’ demands, Niro develops
the TALL FORM DRYER, the SPRAY
FLUIDIZER, the COMPACT DRYER, the
FILTERMAT ® and the Fluidized Spray Dryer
(FSD) and makes more standardized plant
types with wheels and nozzle atomization.
Already in the early 1980s, the demand for
increased accuracy and speed in design
and the project phases made EDB and
later IT important working tools for Niro’s
employees.
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Renovation of facilities and plants
Many of Niro’s customers in the traditional
industrial countries in Western
Europe renovate and update their
plants. Some companies choose to
focus on special products, which often
demand special drying plants. Other
companies redirect their activity into
the pharmaceutical business. Furthermore,
increased requirements for
environmental and occupational safety
demand an upgrade of many existing
plants.
Need for increased drying capacity in
China and India
The need for Niro’s technology and knowledge
increases in recent years, particularly from
China and India, where increased prosperity
and population growth result in greater
consumption of dried products.
Plant size grows
The consumption of chemical products, food
and other products increases steadily, and
Niro’s plants grow as well. Over the last 30-40
years the capacity of Niro’s biggest plant has
grown tenfold. From the 1970s, plants that
can produce 10-20 tons of powder per hour
plus handle higher temperatures of 800-1,000°C
are increasingly in demand.
Demand also increases for atomizers specially
designed for high speeds. Today, atomizers
rotate creating velocities of more than 1,000
km per hour.

Today, Niro’s F-1000 atomizer is the world’s
biggest atomizer. It is equipped with a 1,000
kilowatt motor and is capable of handling
120 tons of feed per hour.