GEA Filtration Commissioned for Beverage Plant

GEA Filtration is currently in the process of commissioning two plants for producing clear malt base for Flavored Alcoholic Beverage (FAB). These are small pilot / production size plants and, depending on the acceptance of the product in their respective markets, GEA Filtration can expect larger plants to be installed later. There are 16 full scale GEA Filtration reference plants in the range of 100 to 200 hl/h currently in operation.

As a neutral basic for so-called FAB (flavoured alcohol beverages), a de-colourized and purified water-alcohol mixture is used. The basic material is beer (fermented alcohol base). Undesirable compounds, such as residual sugar, salts and long-chain colour and aroma components are separated.

GEA Filtration offers a modular plant design for feed rates from 50 to 250 hl/h, plants for higher capacities are designed according to the individual customers” requirements.

Depending on the quality requirements an additional absorption polishing step can be offered.

The membrane filtration plant can easily be integrated into an existing brewery in order to add a FAB process line. The expenditure for equipment is low, the construction is compact using cost-efficient spiral modules and the process is reliable. At at the same time, operating costs are low thanks to energy efficient design and semi-automatic operation. All these features, together with the standardized modular plant design, result in an extremely cost-effective design of the membrane filtration plant.

The process can also be used for other alcoholic base products (e. g. wine, cider).