Beer production in the food & beverage industry

The ingredients for making beer are water, malt, hops and yeast. The malt from large silos is crushed in a mill. This makes it easier to dissolve the substances contained in the malt in the hot brewing water during mashing. The resulting hot brew is then transferred to the lauter tun to separate the solids. The clear wort draining off is then boiled in the wort kettle, with the addition of hops. The next vessel is the ‘whirlpool’, where the wort is introduced tangentially to make the liquid rotate, and the solids are deposited as a cone in the middle. Clear wort can be drawn off from the side of the vessel: it is then cooled in a heat exchanger. The next vessel is a fermentation tank, where sterile air is pumped in to saturate the wort with oxygen, and yeast is added. During the fermentation process, the sugar in the wort is converted into alcohol and carbon dioxide. A secondary fermentation takes place during the subsequent storage. After the final filtration and the addition of finings, the beer can be bottled.

Because of the number of complex process steps, very precise monitoring and process management is necessary to achieve a consistently high quality of the beer. KROHNE offers precisely tailored measuring devices for these tasks. Fast, extremely accurate, robust temperature sensors as well as ultra-compact and modularly expandable pressure transmitters for hygienic pressure and level applications are available with a large number of hygienic connections.

Electromagnetic and Coriolis mass flowmeters provide exact results for simple or demanding hygienic applications. Thanks to the EGM™ technology by KROHNE (Entrained Gas Management), Coriolis devices can even do this with entrained gas content of up to 100%. FMCW radar level transmitters with a large selection of hygienic process connections enable reliable, continuous, non-contact level measurement. Capacitive level switches with little protrusion into the process, are unaffected by foam, condensate or deposits. Sterilisable and autoclavable pH sensors with integrated transmitters and high long-term stability can be connected directly to the process control system. All devices are EHEDG and 3-A certified and meet the requirements of FDA and EC1935 / 2004.