Hello, after months and months of effort, we finally built a KEG washer for our nanobrewery. It has standard cleaning cycles: water rinse - caustic cycle (NaOH, 3% solution) - water rinse - peracetic acid sanitation (2 % solution) - water rinse - CO2 purge and pressurize.
Now I'm dealing with problem with neutralising caustic before the peracetic acid cycle. Acid manufacturer told me, that it's absolutely neccesary to neutralize any caustic residue before the acid comes to KEG, otherwise the acid will be quickly killed.
I'm trying to rinse the caustic with lot of water, but no matter how much I rinse, at the end is still some caustic residue left in the KEG. I disassembled the KEG and rubbed a litmus paper against the spear and the inside of KEG and it's turning still and still slightly blue. Not dramatically, but it's still there.
Now I have 2 ideas. Just ignore the caustic residue suggesting the amout of caustic left is marginal and continue with acid cycle.
The secont option that came on my mind is neutralising caustic with CO2. Just quick rinse with water to remove the major quantity of caustic and then purge the air out with CO2. I read that CO2 kills caustic (despite some fierce reaction with large quantities), do you think it can help the problem?
Many thanks,
Michael
Now I'm dealing with problem with neutralising caustic before the peracetic acid cycle. Acid manufacturer told me, that it's absolutely neccesary to neutralize any caustic residue before the acid comes to KEG, otherwise the acid will be quickly killed.
I'm trying to rinse the caustic with lot of water, but no matter how much I rinse, at the end is still some caustic residue left in the KEG. I disassembled the KEG and rubbed a litmus paper against the spear and the inside of KEG and it's turning still and still slightly blue. Not dramatically, but it's still there.
Now I have 2 ideas. Just ignore the caustic residue suggesting the amout of caustic left is marginal and continue with acid cycle.
The secont option that came on my mind is neutralising caustic with CO2. Just quick rinse with water to remove the major quantity of caustic and then purge the air out with CO2. I read that CO2 kills caustic (despite some fierce reaction with large quantities), do you think it can help the problem?
Many thanks,
Michael
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