Application 01
Ethanol and biofuel dehydration
AZEO-SEP® pervaporation removes water past the 95.6% ethanol azeotrope for fuel-grade and beverage-grade product, without entrainers. The Sarnia bioethanol/ABE refinery hybrid is the related case study.
Industry · Food, Beverage & Biofuels
Food, Beverage & Biofuels
plants and separation, end to end.
Food, beverage, and biofuels applications need both sanitary, traceable fabrication and the right membrane chemistry for the specific feed. We build sanitary 316L vessels and skids with validated cleaning regimes, and we deploy our own membrane platforms for ethanol and biofuel dehydration, protein concentration, beverage and food processing, fermentation product recovery, and distillation optimization. Most delivered work in this sector runs out of PSE Kerteh; the membrane chemistry and process design anchor in Toronto (Mississauga).
What you get
Outcomes our customers see.
Specific to food, beverage & biofuels. Verified on real projects. The numbers below come from work we have shipped, not data sheets.
- Ethanol / biofuel dehydration
- 99.5 wt%
- AZEO-SEP® pervaporation dries fuel and beverage ethanol past the azeotrope without an entrainer.
- Protein plant scale
- 1,000 m³/day
- Completed protein processing plant in China (2016), $15M project value per the PSC Project Highlights table.
- Energy vs evaporation
- 1/5 to 1/3
- Membrane distillation and pervaporation run at 60 to 85°C, well below conventional thermal alternatives.
- Sanitary construction
- Sanitary 316L, FDA-compatible elastomers, validated CIP regimes. The fabrication scope a food or beverage auditor expects to see.
Featured case study
One project, in detail.
How the work shows up on a food, beverage & biofuels site.
Applications
Where we deploy.
What we deliver.
The specific scopes and separation problems we solve for food, beverage & biofuels operators.
Application 02
Protein extraction and concentration
Membrane-based concentration of plant- and animal-derived protein streams. Recent build at PSE Kerteh (April 2026, 13-photo project record) for a food-and-bioprocessing client. Sanitary fabrication, FDA-compatible materials.
Application 03
Food and beverage processing
Concentration, fractionation, and clarification of food and protein streams. Completed protein processing plant in China (2016), 1,000 m³/day capacity. Sanitary 316L, validated cleaning regimes.
Application 04
Fermentation product recovery
Pervaporation and vapor permeation for recovering ethanol, butanol, acetone, and other fermentation products from broth.
Application 05
Process water recovery for food sites
Closed-loop water recovery for food and beverage plants. AQUA-SEP® or MD recovers process water at less than 10 ppm TDS, allowing direct reuse on hot-water duties or polishing for CIP.
Fabrication scope
What we build for this sector.
Sanitary stainless construction with FDA-compatible elastomers, validated cleaning regimes, and full traceability of wetted parts. PSE Kerteh delivers food-grade pressure equipment, skids, and packaged plants to the same ASME and ISO 9001 quality system that backs our industrial scope.
Skids
Skid-mounted process systems
Modular process and utility skids, engineered, packaged, and shipped ready to commission.
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Vessels
Pressure vessels & tanks
Code-stamped pressure equipment, separators, columns, reactors, and storage tanks.
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Plants
Packaged process plants
Built-to-spec process plants, delivered turnkey from drawing to running line.
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Membrane
Membrane plant fabrication
In-house fabrication of our productized AQUA-SEP®, VOC-SEP®, and AZEO-SEP® systems.
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Engineering
Engineering & design
Process engineering, FEED, P&IDs, and fabrication drawings to support build scope.
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Membrane technologies
The right process for the fluid.
Food, beverage, and biofuel feeds split between solvent-bearing vapor (fermentation off-gas, dehydration loops) and process liquid (protein concentrates, food and beverage streams, process water). Pervaporation and vapor permeation handle the first family. MD and SLS handle the second. We pair them when both exist on the same site.
PV
Pervaporation
Selective separation of liquid mixtures, including the azeotropes that distillation cannot break.
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VP
Vapor Permeation
Vapor-phase separation for solvent dehydration and VOC recovery in chemical and pharmaceutical operations.
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MD
Membrane Distillation
Thermally driven separation for fluids that defeat conventional distillation.
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SLS
Solid-Liquid Separation
Concentration and dewatering of complex slurries and biological streams.
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Have a food, beverage & biofuels project
we should look at?
Send drawings, specs, or just the problem. We sign NDAs before discussing your work and respond promptly. If our scope isn't the right fit, we will tell you.