Activated Carbon for Breweries and Distilleries
Riley Equipment Company supplies Activated Coconut Carbon and Catalytic Carbon for breweries, distilleries, and wineries across the nation. Our granular activated carbon (GAC) media effectively filters the undesired material from water including, chlorine, chemical odors, and organic compounds, leaving the water contaminant, taste, and odor-free.
There are many benefits that activated carbon can accomplish for beer, liquors, and wine. More specifically, activated carbon filtration can improve the taste and odor for beer and wine’s color, hue and taste. This is done by reducing the organics and residual disinfectants from the water supply.
Choosing Catalytic Carbon or Activated Coconut Carbon
Typical sources of water for breweries, distilleries, and wineries come from the municipal drinking water. This water could contain traces of organics and residual tastes, odors, chlorine and sometimes chloramines that require removal. There are two types of granular activated carbon media that work the best for beer and wine applications which include activated coconut carbon and catalytic carbon.
Catalytic carbon is a form of GAC that has been specially treated to cause a chemical reaction. If your incoming water source contains chloramines, catalytic carbon would be the most ideal filtration to remove unwanted odors, flavor and organics. This is because the catalytic carbon acts as a catalyst which causes the compounds to decompose. Most cities across the nation are moving toward chloramine chemicals in their water which is a combination of chlorine and ammonia.
Standard Coconut Shell carbon can remove chlorine but will have a hard time removing the ammonia chemicals. If the ammonia is not filtered from your application, it could produce a slight metal aftertaste in your wine or beer.
We recommend reaching out to your water supplier to identify if your water contains chloramines.
Carbon System Process
When choosing how much activated carbon is needed or which system to use, it’s important to consider the pH, particle size and flow rate in your brewery or winery applications.
For the pH levels, organics in the incoming water are less soluble and more adsorbent at lower pH levels. We recommend increasing the size of the of the carbon bed by 20% for every pH unit above neutral.
It is also important to take into consideration the particle size that is being removed. Our activated carbon comes in 3 different sizes 8 by 30 mesh, 12 by 40 mesh and 20 by 50 mesh. The finer mesh provides a more thorough removal process but could increase the pressure drop.
Lastly, flow rate, this will be pertaining to the flow of the water filtration. The lower the flow rate, the more time the contaminant will have to diffuse into a pore and be adsorbed. We recommend maintaining a peak flow of <10GPM f3 when considering higher flow rates with finer mesh carbons.
Riley Equipment Company is available to assist with choosing the most effective granular activated carbon for your winery or brewery application. Contact us today to learn more!
