Dynamic microfiltration

Self-optimising process automation in breweries

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In the SMARTOPTION DigiFood project, the Institute for Energy Research at OWL University of Applied Sciences and Arts is working together with GEA Westfalia Separator Group GmbH (Oelde) and Weidmüller Interface GmbH & Co. KG (Detmold) on dynamic microfiltration with AI support for the cost-effective recovery of secondary yeast streams in breweries.
The German Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL) is sponsoring eleven DigiFood projects in order to drive digital transformation in the food sector forwards through networking and knowledge transfer.

The recovery of beer by filtering surplus yeast saves raw materials and energy, avoids food waste and improves cost effectiveness in the brewing process. At the same time, it increases the quality and concentration of the surplus yeast as a secondary product. Beer recovery is a typical process in the food industry for processing continuous streams of raw materials of variable quality, which have so far only been mastered to a limited extent by automation technology.

Tanks for a smooth fermentation process

Rotoramic-Anlage
Rotoramic-Anlagen

Rotoramic system

The Rotoramic systems from GEA are based on an innovative dynamic filtration process involving rotating ceramic membranes. Thanks to their lower operating pressures, they require less energy compared to conventional cross-flow membrane filtration systems and are easier to scale, with the result that this technically very complex yeast filtration process can be controlled cost-effectively not only at large, but also at medium-sized and small breweries. Since the brewing industry in Germany is characterised by a comparatively large proportion of small and medium-sized breweries, this innovative technology can make a significant contribution to resource efficiency, especially for agricultural raw materials.

Rotoramic-Anlagen

For efficient and continuous operation of the Rotoramic systems, the filtrate and retentate outflows as well as the unfiltrate inflow and its concentration must be adjusted automatically, whereby an unknown unfiltrate suspension of initially variable quantity and quality is present in the brewing process. The thus far conventional process design, management and monitoring do not enable the full exploitation of the technology’s achievable potential, which is necessary for cost-effective implementation at small companies. Among other aspects, this concerns the mean filtrate volumetric flow (flux), the energy costs, the service life up to the cleaning cycle or the so far incompletely continuous operating mode due to backflushing.
The objective of the proposed project is to optimise the process and the Rotoramic systems’ process automation using Industry 4.0 methods in order to achieve: