Seminar: Cormac O'Kelly

September 27, 2024

Food Manufacturing: The History, Development, and Challenges of Control Systems

Cormac O’Kelly, Southwest Cheese, Clovis, NM

3:00 pm, UNM Centennial Engineering Center, Room 1026
Online Guests: Contact Prof. Osiński <osinski@chtm.unm.edu> for a Zoom link

Abstract: This talk is focused on the manufacturing industry, in particular, food manufacturing. We will provide a brief overview of our company Glanbia, and our local subsidiary Southwest Cheese. We will cover the cheese and whey manufacturing process with details surrounding the manufacturing industry and the challenges we currently face. We will outline the life cycle of the process, discuss the technological advancement of food manufacturing in the last decade, and the impact of controls in the industry. Discussion will focus on industry best practices for automation and controls and the current setup of our facility. We will talk about the risk of cyber security and the work that is undertaken to secure our facilities from ransomware and other malicious software. We will then discuss how a large manufacturer addresses these areas and how they stay on top of new developments in a fast-moving technological world. Finally, we will briefly discuss Industry 4.0 and smart manufacturing technology that is emerging and how AI can impact the industry going forward.

Bio: Cormac O’Kelly received a B.Sc. degree in Mechanical Engineering, and a B.A. degree from University College Dublin, Ireland in 2011. He obtained a graduate engineering position for Glanbia after graduation and moved to the Southwest Cheese Facility in New Mexico in 2012. He has held various engineering positions, including Graduate Engineer, Project Engineer, Engineering Manager, Maintenance and Engineering Manager, and Environmental, Health, and Safety Engineer. He has led and implemented projects that value over $120M, has managed a team of over 60 people, and managed annual budgets in excess of $14M. In his current role, he is responsible for all engineering projects and processes, environmental, health and safety submissions to the appropriate state and national bodies, including EPA, New Mexico Environment Department, and OSHA.