As Milk Components Continue To Rise, Milk Standardizing Becomes More Widespread

Mohawk, MI—With component levels in milk continuing to increase, dairy processors are increasingly standardizing their milk to better regulate their processes and produce the same quality products, according to Ilenn Johnson, a process engineer at Mohawk Technology.

Standardizing is the regulation of components in milk for a product, Johnson explained. Usually, fat and protein are the main components being controlled, but other components like lactose may be monitored and cheese makers often pay attention to the total concentration of solids suspended in the water.

Improvements in genetics via selective breeding and improved feed components have increased the richness of milk to an all-time high, Johnson noted.

While US milk production has remained relatively flat in recent years, butterfat and protein levels within the nation’s milk supply are growing at a record pace as more producers are employing genetics to optimize milk composition, according to a recent CoBank report.

Butterfat posted its fourth straight annual record when evaluating data going back over a century, noted the CoBank report, which was written by Corey Geiger and Abbi Prins. In 2021, milkfat broke through the 4 percent ceiling and bested a 76-year-old record that stood since the close of World War II. In 2024, butterfat levels charged even higher to average 4.23 percent nationally, based on calculations using monthly data from USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS).

Protein content has been climbing, too, with new consecutive yearly records posted from 2016 to 2024, Geiger and Prins noted. The 2024 milk marketing year finished with a 3.29 percent average protein content. This bookends a “tremendous upward move” considering protein levels stood at 3.04 percent in 2004, based on federal milk marketing order data.

So why is standardizing important for dairy manufacturers? For cheese plants, different makes of cheese require different component profiles, Johnson noted. A Cheddar cheese has a certain amount of fat and protein – the chief concerns for standardizing – while Mozzarella has a lower fat content.

Cheese makers also target certain consumers or work with sellers to develop new products that are variations of classic recipes, Johnson explained. It may be the case that plants are required to modify the makeup of milk coming in to meet criteria for certain cheese. A lactose-free cheese for those with sensitivities is an example.

Removing components such as protein, fat, and lactose can also create additional revenue streams. Plants can sell fat in the form of cream to butter makers or other dairy packers, and dry protein and lactose powders, Johnson said.

For milk bottling, the focus is primarily on fat. Consumers have become familiar with the classical options of skim, 1 percent, 2 percent, and whole milk. Bottling plants will skim milk in their process and blend cream back into the bottling stream to reconstitute the aforementioned fat levels. Excess cream is then sold as heavy cream, used for butter, or even used for half and half.

The biggest milk bottlers are also regulating other components in the milk, Johnson pointed out. The rise of ultra-pasteurized high protein milk now being sold for premium prices and marketed as ultrafiltered is an example. This is actually a real term referencing the filtering membrane micron rating, and not just a marketing ploy.

For ice cream makers, fat control is again the name of the game since ice cream is a high-fat product, usually up to 15 percent fat by weight, Johnson said. For most, consistency is key to maintaining customer perception of their premium products. This helps companies differentiate and justify pricing compared to budget brands, which sell products with lower fats and even fat substitutes like oils. Some makers are also producing and marketing high protein ice cream to find their niche in the market.

EQUIPMENT OPTIONS FOR STANDARDIZING MILK

There are various options for machinery to remove or add components in the milk stream, Johnson explained. Most common are centrifugal separators to remove fat and membrane filtration systems to concentrate streams by removing water.

In today’s dairy market, no part of the milk stream is wasted, Johnson said. Rather, every component removed from the milk stream is refined and used for other products. It can also be stored and blended back into the next product run.

Standardizing controls are complex and require sampling of the streams — inputs to the plant PLC — and control of the different systems en route to production — outputs from the plant PLC, Johnson said.

He said it’s worth noting that all streams have at least trace amounts of all components since no machine is perfect. While a separator is classically used to remove fat, the cream stream coming off will also have protein, meaning it impacts the protein control as well.

In the near future, Johnson said it’s reasonable to think that two things will happen:

• Natural fat and protein levels in milk will continue to increase as dairy farmers continue to improve their product.

Geiger and Prins noted that genetic selection could very well push butterfat content to over 5 percent in the next decade if herd management, particularly nutrition, can keep up with genetics. Meanwhile, protein is highly and positively correlated to butterfat in the world of dairy cattle genetics; if progress is made on one trait, the other follows suit.

• Processors of all capacities and products will be working on integrating standardizing systems to better regulate their process and produce the same quality products.

In addition, processors will be crunching numbers and installing standardizing equipment or using existing equipment with improved programming to open doors to increased revenue, Johnson said.

For more information about Mohawk Technology, visit www.mohawktechnology.com.

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