Plate Pasteurizer (HTST) Product

Overview

A plate pasteurizer runs the High-Temperature Short-Time (HTST) process: product is raised to pasteurization temperature, held there just long enough to kill pathogens, then cooled — all in a continuous flow rather than batch by batch. The heart of the machine is a plate heat exchanger, a clamped stack of thin pressed-metal plates that forms hundreds of narrow channels carrying product and heating or cooling media in alternating layers. Because the plates are thin and corrugated, heat crosses them quickly and the streams run turbulent, so a compact stack transfers a large duty. The design also recovers most of its own energy: outgoing hot product preheats incoming cold product, which is why running costs stay low.

How it works

Cold product is metered in by the Product Feed Pump, a timing pump that fixes the flow rate so the holding time is guaranteed. It first passes through the Plate Heat Exchanger's regeneration section, where outgoing hot product warms it for free, then through the heating section where hot water brings it to temperature. That hot water is produced and circulated by the Hot Water Set, whose electric heaters and steam-injection valve trim the loop to set-point.

At temperature, product flows through the Holding Tube, a length of insulated tube sized so the dwell meets the legal holding time before reaching the exit temperature probe. If the Instrument Set reads the exit temperature below the safe limit, the Flow Diversion Valve swings to return that product to the balance tank instead of letting it pass forward — the core food-safety interlock of the design. The Booster Pump holds the pasteurized side above the raw side so any pinhole plate leak can only flow the safe direction.

Properly held product then loses its heat back in the regeneration section and is chilled to fill temperature in the cooling section. The Control System holds temperature, logs every batch, and commands the divert valve; between runs the CIP Cleaning System recirculates detergent and rinse through the plates and tube so the wetted path is cleaned without opening the stack.