Objetivou-se, neste artigo, estimar os custos envolvidos no processo de resfriamento do leite cru, tipo B, após a implantação
da Instrução Normativa 51 e a verificação das possÃveis fontes de economias de escala nesse processo. A partir dos conceitos da
engenharia econômica calculou-se o custo uniforme lÃquido equivalente de investimento do processo de resfriamento do leite, que
somado ao custo operacional, resultou no custo uniforme lÃquido total por litro de leite. Concluiu-se que existe forte tendência Ã
economia de escala nessa atividade devido aos retornos crescentes no custo de investimento e operacional, conforme aumenta-se a
capacidade dos tanques de resfriamento.
This article aims to estimate the costs involved in the milk cooling process after the Normative Instruction 51 was issued and
it also aims to verify the sources of economies scale. Using the concepts of the economical engineering, the uniform net costs of the
investment in the milk cooling process were calculated. They were added to the operational cost and it resulted in the total uniform
net cost per unit. It was concluded that there is a strong tendency to economies scale in the milk cooling process as a consequence of
the growing returns in the investment and operational costs as the milk cooling tank capacity increases.
