Packaging diversity in the brewing and beverage industry has been on the increase for years. For example, whereas all German brewers filled more or less the same beer crates with identical Euro bottles in times past, one nowadays finds a colourful mix of bottle shapes and packaging types. In any event, this plus in versatility involves more changeovers, in particular more sorting and repacking costs, in a nutshell: machinery and equipment has to comply with more complex specifications. Nevertheless, packers and palletisers in the brewing and beverage industry must, at the same time, be reliable, effective and economical. This circumscribes an environment in which freely programmable and flexibly adaptable robot solutions score – especially when in gantry-frame design.

Tests were carried out in order to investigate the influence of mashing conditions such as temperature, time and pH on the development of precursors such as ferulic and p-coumaric phenolic acids. Another objective related to identifying a means of minimizing cinnamic acid, a precursor of styrene. This contribution drawn up in the context of a research project provides an overview of interrelationships and possibilities of influencing the process.

In most breweries nowadays, the whirlpool is a state-of-the-art system to remove hot trub from wort. A decanter, when used in combination with a whirlpool, will decrease wort losses to a minimum while positively influencing the quality of the wort and the resulting beer. This article introduces the Intelligent Whirlpool System (IWS) developed by Alfa Laval Copenhagen, Denmark.

Water used as raw material and for technological processes in the brewing industry is by no means chemically pure and undergoes rapid changes in terms of chemical and microbiological composition. Depending on hydrogeological conditions, compositions of waters vary, as does the quality of natural waters. The fact that water is a good solvent for polar and ionic substances with high thermal capacity and heat of evaporation makes it suitable for many technical applications.

One of the major parts of the beer brewing process is filtration as it is crucial for producing high quality beer with excellent flavor and color, and with good shelf stability. Filtration has always placed high demands on filter media and until a couple of decades ago depth filter sheets were being changed after every filtration. However, the brewing industry has now discovered new ways to increase profitability and significantly reduce filtration costs: through backwashing and regeneration of the filters.

Use of chlorine dioxide for disinfection of drinking, process and industrial water, for bottle disinfection and for disinfection of plants and plant components has been common practice in beverage production for decades. However, the oxidising disinfectant causes corrosion on metal surfaces. The corrosion behaviour of austenitic chromium-nickel steel 1.4301 (304SS, V2 A) at different concentrations of chlorine dioxide has been investigated in the Dr. Küke GmbH laboratory, Wedemark. A chlorine dioxide solution containing hydrochloric acid and a pH neutral one was used.

Although the annual world beer production is steadily increasing, the hop production is decreasing. A reason is the technological progress made on the conversion rate leading to a better utilization of the α-acids towards the iso-α-acids during beer production. However, scientific data on the evolution of the hoppy aroma of beer is rare and the hop-derived aroma of beer, or more precisely the volatile composition of hops, is significantly influenced by the brewing process. In order to introduce unique flavor profiles into beer, huge amounts of hops are still necessary. For this reason, this study traces the changes of the hop-derived volatiles occurring during beer manufacturing of single hopped beers with and without additional dry hopping.

With a present-day capacity of over 8 million hectolitres, St. James’s Gate in Dublin is the world’s biggest stout brewery. Sustainable brewing was most definitely a paramount focus. Dramatically high energy savings in the brewing process for the global Guinness brand are being achieved by the Diageo Group in its new brewhouse using the Steinecker EquiTherm. For this new construction job called “Project Phoenix” Krones supplied three brewing lines, including Europe’s largest lauter tun in the new Brewhouse No. 4 at St. James’s Gate Brewery.

Karbach Brewing Company in Houston is producing its first beers on a new brewhouse supplied by Ziemann, Ludswigsburg/Germany. As part of Karbach’s capacity expansion, Ziemann also supplied the new fermentation tanks and a state of the art automation system.

Olympic Brewery in Greece was one of the first breweries to opt for a new system for beer stabilization with regenerated, reusable PVPP. The main selection criteria were the compactness of the modular system which runs 24/7 with no downtimes, short setup times for system startup or shutdown and short switching times.

Krones’ Steinecker plant in Freising has dispatched two Pegasus C lauter tuns, each holding 210,000 litres, to Munich-Langwied – packed in four halves, each measuring 11.50 m in diameter. Transported during six hours of the night as a special consignment with a convoy of four low-loaders, these components kicked off a delivery marathon, extending up to the end of January 2015, for Paulaner’s new brewery, which is currently taking shape on a 15-hectare site in the west of Munich and has initially been dimensioned for an output of 3.5 million hectolitres of beer (at its original premises, Paulaner was most recently brewing 3 mio hl).