DE19812684A1 - Extraction of residual fluids from beer mash and fermentation stages, increases volume of beer produced from same quantity of ingredients - Google Patents

Abstract

In a beer brewing process mashed ingredients pass along a filter belt (202, 204) through a filter chamber. The belt edges are sealed against the chamber edges. The pressure is vacuum-reduced in lower part of the chamber. The same filtration process is applied following the fermentation stage. An Independent claim is also included for an apparatus for carrying out the new method.

Description

The invention relates to a method for the production of beer. The main goal of this Invention is a method to propose that the current product losses and the the resulting wastewater problems and costs are significantly reduced.

An estimate of worldwide product losses in beer breweries based on pre and End products are 20-30%. The main sources of loss occur in the preparation of mash, -filtration and the subsequent beer clarification processes after fermentation. Due to incomplete decomposition of the starch and polyses to fermentable sugar of the mash preparation, product losses of up to 20% are caused. Because of incomplete washing out of the residual sugar in the coarse-grained filter bed of the The lauter tun is lost up to 10% of the available fermentation sugar. In the after the The subsequent beer clarification process depends on the brewing or Clarification processes, e.g. B. if top or bottom fermentation or if conditioning agents is used to anticipate beer losses of up to 10%. For every liter of Beer produced is 5-10 liters of biologically contaminated wastewater.

The invention

Fig. 1 shows the flow diagram of a conventional method of a brewery. The cost-causing stages of the clarification processes 103 , 105 , 107 , 109 , 110 , 112 , 113 , 114 , 116 , 117 are replaced by the stages 202 , 204 of the method of the invention illustrated in FIG. 2. The latter devices correspond to a further development of the belt filter system described in DE 44 37 175. These are belt filters with a filter chamber through which a filter belt can be transported in batches over a support surface and is divided into a lower filtrate chamber and an upper turbidity chamber by the support surface, the turbidity chamber being designed like a lid and the filter belt during operation if a pressure drop occurs in the filter chamber is sealingly guided between the edges of the filter cover and the filtrate chamber. The advantage of the further development of this pressure filter is the ability to filter finely divided solid suspensions in the absence of air in a fully automated manner, whereby removable solids and sterile filtrate are generated. The use of membrane filter elements with pore sizes of 0.01-1.0 microns grinds malt or grain meal for mash preparation with average grain sizes of 20-100 microns. Such values lead to a considerably improved sugar yield of the mash during the wort production and washing out of the resulting filter cake. According to the invention, the finely divided mashed meal suspended in water is placed in a reactor-like tub 201 , after gradual heating by means of the heating jacket 213 , placed under vacuum by means of the vacuum generating device 216 and then immediately blown with steam through a distributor 217 , the undesired, volatile portion of the mash is removed by a relatively low temperature. Then, in order to separate out further undesirable protein-like substances, the mash is cooled by means of the hot jacket 213 and then filtered through the above-mentioned filter system 202 . According to the invention, both the materials separated by heat and those by cold are filtered off without flaking with the aid of the remaining, finely divided sleeve residue of the finely ground malt by means of the membrane elements. The filter cake is then carried out dry after desugarization. The clarified, cooled wort is then fed to the reactor-like fermentation tank 203 , whereby, in order to remove the protein-like substances still present in the solution but also produced during the fermentation before but also during the fermentation, suitable adsorbent such as silica, resin, etc. is used. added. The purpose of this process according to the invention is to keep the fermenting wort free from turbidity and substances which cause turbidity in order to achieve a stabilized beer during fermentation. According to the invention, in order to better control the fermentation and therefore the metabolism of the yeast cells, programmed relationships are maintained during the fermentation between the temperature, pressure and carbon dioxide development of the fermentation process by means of regulators 223 , 220 , 218 . During fermentation and the subsequent filtration, the digestate is gently held in suspension by the agitator 222 . This serves to ensure the sterility of the operating facilities, the quality and yield of the beer, a smooth fermentation process and a considerable reduction in the cleaning effort of the fermentation tank 203 and the filter system 204 and therefore the wastewater problem. According to the invention, in order to protect the yeast cells present in the digestate, the digestate is then printed by means of compressed gas through the membrane filter element sealed in the filter chamber. The beer sterilized and stabilized in this way is then packaged directly 207 .

The resulting dewatered yeast filter cake is then discharged 215 . According to the invention, the majority of the greatly reduced wastewater produced in the method of the invention described above is produced during the cleaning and sterilization of the filter systems 202 , 204 . According to the invention, in order to treat the waste water and reuse it for cleaning and sterilization purposes, a further membrane filter system 211 is used. According to the invention, the entire alcohol and wort-containing container rinse water from 201 , 203 and de-sugaring water from 202 , 204 is used as feed water for the preparation of the mash. This creates a closed brewery with regard to waste water.

Reference list Key to Fig. 1 Conventional brewery

101

Doing mash

102

Mash kettle

103

Purification

104

Wort kettle

105

Hop filter

106

Wort tub

107

centrifuge

108

Wort cooler

109

Brewing kettle

110

centrifuge

111

cooler

112

Conditioning kettle

113

centrifuge

114

Beer filter

115

pasteurization

116

Yeast filter

117

Sediment filter

Key to Fig. 2 Method of the invention

201

Mash kettle

202

Mash filter

203

Brewing kettle

204

Beer filter

207

Bottling line

211

Wastewater treatment

213

Heat transfer jacket

215

Yeast delivery

216

Vacuum system

217

Steam supply

218

CO ₂

-Flow regulator

219

Heating / coolant supply

220

Pressure regulator

222

Proofing tank agitator

223

Temperature controller

Claims (7)

1. A method for the production of beer, characterized in that belt filters 202 , 204 with filter chambers through which a filter belt can be transported in batches via a support surface and is divided by the support surface into a lower filtrate chamber and an upper turbidity chamber, the turbidity chamber being designed like a lid and the filter belt, during operation when there is a pressure drop in the filter chamber, is sealingly guided between the edges of the filter cover and the filtrate chamber, for the tasks of mash or digestate filtration. 2. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that the to be filtered Mash from ground malt with an average grain size of up to 0-100 microns will be produced. 3. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that to the fermented beer Clarify and stabilize the wort before and / or during fermentation the fermentation is dosed with adsorbents such as silica, resin, etc. 4. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that the mash at the Mash production, after gradual heating under vacuum and the same is then blown with steam. 5. A method according to claims 2 & 4, characterized in that the mash is the same is cooled after steaming and before filtration. 6. A method for the production of beer, characterized in that the fermentation in the fermentation tank 203 is controlled by a programmed relationship between the temperature, pressure and carbon dioxide development in the fermentation tank during the fermentation. 7. A method for the production of beer, characterized in that the belt filter 211 with filter chamber through which a filter belt can be transported in batches over a support surface and is divided by the support surface into a lower filtrate chamber and an upper turbidity chamber, the turbidity chamber being designed like a lid and the filter belt is used during operation when there is a pressure drop in the filter chamber, sealingly guided between the edges of the filter cover and the filtrate chamber, for the task of treating and recovering the wastewater obtained in the production of beer.