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Food Processing Clean Room Construction Company

Cleanroom technology involves the control of air purity, airflows, air pressurization, and air temperature and humidity. It involves not just the air system, but the physical design of the room or space and the procedures required of the occupants of the room or space.

Cleanrooms are most commonly found in Microelectronics, Pharmaceutical, and Biotech applications. But increasingly food manufacturers are turning to Cleanroom technology to control airborne contamination and increase product shelf-life. Food industry Cleanrooms are clearly less “clean” than those found in semiconductor or sterile pharmaceutical applications. The requirements for the Food Processing Cleanroom vary depending on the food being produced. For example the requirements in a bakery (a dry process) are going to be less stringent than in the (wet) dairy industry. Even within the dairy industry, the requirements for fluid milk will generally be less than for yogurt or cultured milk, where bacterial activity is more intense.

Food processors will usually consider Cleanroom technology because they are concerned with the spread of bacteria, yeasts and molds that can grow in the moist conditions of process areas and are carried by air currents throughout the food plant. The aim will be to keep the air in the immediate vicinity of the food being processed free from such microbial contaminants. This can reduce or eliminate the need for pasteurization or flash freezing process stages and lead to a better, fresher food product.  Process steps, in which an air exchange with the unclean, germ contaminated environment cannot be prevented, lead to:

•       germ contamination of foodstuffs
•       limitation of shelf life
•       reduced freshness
•       reduced yield

Food Processing Cleanroom Technology for Fresher Food Products

The first stage of an evaluation of Cleanroom technology should be to specify exactly the contamination problem to be solved i.e. “What is the contamination and at what stage in the process is it affecting the food?”  It may be worthwhile to have air around the process sampled and analyzed to check that contamination observed on the food is present in the air supply. The type of contaminant will impact the design of the filtration. Once the contamination problem is defined, a Cleanroom specialist should be involved as Cleanroom technology is much more involved than commercial or industrial ventilation and air conditioning.

Unified Cleanroom Construction will help you develop a Cleanroom specification that will be correct for your needs avoiding the danger of investing in a system that either doesn’t work or that provides more protection than actually required at an unnecessarily high cost.