A number of products manufactured by the agro-foods industry require a higher level of purity to meet health and stability related guarantees. Activated carbons act as refining agents. The action of activated carbon is not based on the addition of chemicals but rather on their elimination; a major advantage with growing consumer concern over the use of chemical products in food and food processing.
Purifying and decolorizing food products
Issues:
Fading the food flours
Targeted compounds:
Purifying the sugar
Solutions:
The industrial production of oils, sugars and beverages requires physical and chemical treatment process as well as product refinement. Activated carbons are at the heart of the treatment process. They eliminate the impurities coming from either raw material or from the process itself (toxic byproducts coming from drying, products salted out by resins, etc.), thereby guaranteeing the purity and stability of the finished products. They are also used to correct colour, odour and taste.
In this field, PICA offers a complete range of activated carbons in both powder and granular form, manufactured from wood or coconut. When colour regulation is the primary objective, PICA recommends a wood-based activated carbon; the large pore size is suited to the large size colour molecules. But when purification is the primary objective, PICA recommends coconut shell-based carbons, which present the advantage of being highly pure and highly active.
PICA has activated carbons specific to every type of industry: cooking oils and glycerin, sugar and glucose, fruit juice, protein and enzymes, wines and alcohol, food additives.
The activated carbons supplied by PICA in this sector respond to the demands of standard food industry norms (Food Chemical Codex, etc) and more specific ones (oenological, Kosher, Halal, etc). They are made exclusively from renewable resources - coconut shells or wood - according to procedures guaranteeing the absence of any possible contamination (metals etc.).
They may be supplied in various types of packaging, from a 10kg sack to bulk deliveries, even including a soluble bag which is clean and simple to use (for powder activated carbons).