Sterilization of caps for drinking yogurt packaging line
L’Armoricaine Laitière, a French cooperative located in Brittany, packages own brand drinking yogurt on a number of Serac lines.. It specializes in fermented milks and produces 3,000,000 liters of ribot milk and 10,000 tonnes of yogurt to drink per year. The company joined the Laïta group in 2015.
Pulsed light was chosen to decontaminate 32 mm caps for capping 180 g bottles, to replace irradiation. The Claranor solution, installed by Serac in 2010, was chosen rather than a chemical solution for reasons of cost and simplicity of installation.
- Product: Flavored drinking yogurt and muesli drinking yogurt, stored <4 ° C
- Shelf life: 28 to 35 days
- Packaging: HDPE flat cap, 32 mm, for 180 g bottles
- Line: existing Serac line, speed 22,000 bph (8,000 T / year)
- Microbiological problem: risk of mold and yeast
Watch the video of the cap sterilization on the production line
Serac testimonial
Roland Nicolas, Director of Food business development, Serac
“The markets are pushing for dry decontamination without chemicals. Serac has therefore shown a keen interest in pulsed light technology. Serac and Claranor have built a common experience in providing pulsed light technology for the treatment of plastic caps with several lines installed and successfully for fresh dairy products. ”
Customer testimonial
Jean-Paul Linet, Managing Director, l’Armoricaine Laitière
"Since we have logistics and transport problems, we have to ensure the safety of the production chain, in order to respect our shelf life objective. The closure is a critical point in our packaging process, because in direct contact with the product, which is why we looked with Serac for a disinfection solution for our caps.
We considered the Claranor pulsed light because of its advantages: simple to integrate and use, no chemicals in the process, no odor or noise in the factory also as low operating costs.