Increasing HPP Throughput: JBT Avure Debuts Basket Innovation

Interested in High Pressure Processing (HPP), but keen to maintain your current throughout levels? JBT Avure HPP has recently debuted larger basket sizes to enable a significantly higher loading capacity than was previously available in the industry with the result that customers can process far greater volumes during each HPP cycle.

Avure’s innovation represents an ingenious solution to increasing HPP throughput without impacting footprint and floorspace, while at the same time helping customers save on utility costs by getting more product processed during each cycle.

“Rather than increasing the size of the HPP machines to grow capacity, Avure has increased the diameter of our baskets,” says JBT Avure’s senior VP of microbiology, Dr Errol Raghubeer.

“The loading capacity is significantly higher if you have a wider diameter compared with a smaller diameter.”

The result? More products per cycle. “Even through you have two vessels that have a capacity of 525 liters, a vessel that is more chubby – shorter with a wider diameter – will put more products through than the same vessel that is 525-liter, but is longer with a smaller diameter,” Dr Raghubeer explains. “The reason is you are going to be using up more depth space with a bigger diameter.”

(l-r) JBT Avure’s AV-10 single basket, 350-L two-basket AVM, and 525-L two-basket AVX.

As a comparison, with a three-minute hold time at 6,000 bars, the Avure’s AV-10 pressure vessel (with a 90L basket volume and a 65% fill efficiency) can achieve a throughput of 1,290lb per hour. The AV-40X with a 475L basket volume and an 80% fill efficiency can process more than 5,000lb of product every hour. The industry’s highest throughput system Avure’s AV-70X can produce over 9,000lb per hour at 6,000 bars with a three-minute hold time.

A clean-label technology, HPP can extend the shelf-life of most foods for 60 to 180 days: that’s as much as two or four times longer than traditional preservation methods. And HPP also has the advantage of maintaining the food’s natural nutrition, freshness, texture, and flavor.

The all-natural process uses pure water at incredibly high pressures – of up to 6,000 bar or 87,000 psi – to inactivate food-borne pathogens, like listeria, E. coli, and salmonella without preservatives, chemicals or heat.