Pasteurization For Beer

The purpose of beer pasteurization is to ensure that the beer is biologically stable and therefore it facilitates long term preservation. Beer pasteurization requires a minimum temperature and a minimum time for pasteurization, which kills any contaminating biological bacteria that may be present in the beer.
There are usually two methods of pasteurization, one before bottling and the other after bottling.

Pre-bottling pasteurization, also called flash pasteurization, is usually achieved by using a heat exchanger to heat and cool the beer. During flash beer pasteurization, the beer is heated to 68°C-72°C while maintaining this temperature for about 50 seconds, and then the temperature is lowered to the initial stage temperature. Flash pasteurization is popular in many breweries because of the small brewery area required and the advantages of low equipment costs and low energy costs.
Post-bottling pasteurization is called tunnel sterilization. It consists of multiple sets of tunnel sterilization machines. In this combined machine, it is divided into a number of different temperature zones. Bottled beer goes through these different temperature zones: preheating ——, heating sterilization – cooling stage —– and entering the outside of the tunnel sterilizer.

The difference between flash pasteurization and tunnel sterilization is that in tunnel sterilization, bottles and bottled beer are sterilized at the same time, and obviously tunnel sterilization also gives reliable results.