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Wort its weight in gold: Krones kits out Grupo Petropolis breweries

By Ben BOUCKLEY

- Last updated on GMT

Steinecker Stromboli wort boiling system from Krones
Steinecker Stromboli wort boiling system from Krones

Related tags Brewing

Krones has supplied and installed the equipment for two Grupo Petropolis breweries in Brazil and claims the wort boilers alone yields significant energy, water and chemical savings.

Grupo Petropolis finished one 6m hectoliter site with Krones’ help in late 2013 near Salvador de Bahia and a second facility near Recife is slated to open in mid-2014. Both sites are in Northern Brazil.

Both identical sites feature 62,000 bottle/hour returnable glass and 128,000 can/hour lines, and Krones supplied the brewhouse, cellarage and filtration systems and filling machinery.

The German company also built 18 fermentation and storage tanks and 12 bright beer tanks for each brewery; with the Recife facility complete Petropolis will operate six breweries across Brazil.

Beer processing equipment installed by Krones includes the Variomill wet mill to filter beer, the ShakesBeer mash copper to stabilize taste and a Pegasus C system to filter beer wort that gives low solids content.

Wort boiling system saves energy

Krones claims its Stromboli wort boiling system consumes 40% less energy than conventional systems, while a SHIELD tunnel pasteuriser has low water consumption.

Boiling extracts the bittering, flavour and aroma from the hops, and sterilizes the wort – which is the liquid extracted from the mashing process during the brewing of beer.

The wort contains sugars that will be fermented by brewing yeast to produce alcohol, and after the boiling process the hot wort is quickly cooled before yeast is added to start fermentation.

The Stromboli system saves energy due to a reduction of 3-4% in total wort evaporation, while the burden from spent gases, amounts of fresh and waste water and cleaning agents used is also cut.

Grupo Petropolis beer brands include Itaipava, Crystal, Lokal, Black Princess Gold, Petra and Weltenburger Kloster, but also produces energy and sports drinks, waters and vodkas.

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