Hygiene in the 'food': clean compressed air!

The food industry likes to use compressed air because of its "clean" nature. Not everyone knows that compressed air is in principle not clean, but almost always contains particles, water and oil. In the context of hygiene, measures are necessary to prevent and monitor this contamination. BEKO TECHNOLOGIES offers a complete service to identify the contamination, take measures and secure it.

To get right to the point: untreated compressed air is, by definition, not clean. Not even when an oil-free compressor is used. Although it does not add oil during the production of compressed air, it does draw in the air required from the environment in question. This actually always contains hydrocarbons; especially when an industrial environment is involved. When an oil-lubricated compressor is used and the compressed air is not treated, it is contaminated anyway.

Aware of the danger

Sara Deckers, technical specialist at BEKO: "Especially in the food industry it is very important to pay attention to this. And it's not so much about the compressed air used for drives, but especially the compressed air that comes into direct contact with the product. For example, when the medium is used to blow components or installations clean, to 'shoot' rejected product out of a stream or to aerate products such as ice cream."

In many cases, companies are not sufficiently aware of the contamination that can be found in compressed air; let alone the options available to prevent this contamination from coming into contact with food. And they really should be. After all, moisture can lead to bacterial growth while dust and oil particles are not specifically meant to be consumed. Deckers: "Of course you have food-grade oils. But let's face it: you'd rather not ingest those either."

Complete program

To support customers in achieving clean compressed air in their production environment, BEKO developed a special program involving a four-step process. In the first step, a baseline measurement is carried out by measuring solid particles, water and oil content at the appropriate location for several hours. These values are compared with end-user requirements for compressed air - whether or not based on regulations. The quality of compressed air is determined using a so-called ISO table in which the 3-digit value says something about the proportion of solid particles, water and oil in the compressed air. Deckers: "This baseline measurement gives you an indication of whether you need to take measures or not. If the values are just fine, we advise you to continue on the same path. In the vast majority of cases, however, this is not the case and measures are needed to improve the quality. For this we can give advice, which will show that often with relatively small changes you can already achieve the desired effect. Then, in step three, the necessary measures are implemented, such as deploying a filter, a dryer or a catalytic converter that breaks down hydrocarbons into harmless substances like water and CO2."

Step four is at least as important and involves monitoring the quality of the compressed air after the measures have been implemented. A filter will become saturated over time and aging of the system can also contribute to contamination in the compressed air. Even if all the required measures have been taken. Deckers concludes, "It is not an unnecessary luxury to take a close look at the quality of your compressed air. Specialists like BEKO have all the experience to provide the right advice for this. Both with regard to the entire compressed air installation and possibly components to improve and maintain the quality. Please contact us without obligation; we will look at your installation together."