WIJNLAND MAGAZINE FEATURE

‘n Nuwe Horison Wat Wag – WineLand Magazine Feature

Beveratech’s expertise, broad range of technologies and highlights of some recent ground breaking projects are featured in the March edition of Wijnland Magazine. The article is re-published here by courtesy of Wijnland Magazine and writer Wanda Augustyn.

Founded in 2003, Beveratech is an innovative company with three important legs, agriculture, processing and engineering, respectively headed by Schalk le Roux (agriculture), Kobus Cornelissen and Bennie Hamman (processing) and Christie van Zyl (engineering and installations).

By partnering with customers, Beveratech improves the customer’s productivity and profitability and seeks new ways to improve performance. Dedicated to those who are linked to the land, namely farmers, fruit storage, wineries, factories, industries, universities and research & development, Beveratech has never outgrown, nor forgotten, its original core values of integrity, quality, commitment, dedication, creativity and innovation.

“Those values determine the way we work, the quality we offer, and the unsurpassed treatment you get as our valued customer and employee,” says Kobus Cornelissen, one of the directors of Beveratech. “Beveratech aims to be the leading supplier of technology, products, services and solutions to the wine industry. We will always strive to deliver the highest quality of work and to engineer the future with the latest technology and services. We operate in a national and global environment and strive for dynamic and mutually beneficial relations with a wide range of partners, customers and suppliers.”

One of the latest proud projects Beveratech has been involved in, is Du Toitskloof Winery, where a new and first for the co-operative world has been installed, the Bucher Inertys, with which wines are pressed under a controlled atmosphere.

Kobus explains, “The Bucher Vaslin process of pressing under controlled atmosphere guarantees 100% of the pressed juice is extracted without oxidation because of the permanent operation in a closed loop. The gas used is recycled by means of a flexible reserve, and can thus serve several times with reduced cost. This is another benefit of the full automatic process.”

After years of being solely dedicated to white and rosé wines, the Bucher Inertys now has a new application. This patented process of pressing under inert gas with gas recycling is now suitable for any type of wine to reveal the aromatic potential of fresh grapes, as well as to enhance the quality of the red marc pressings. “This versatile machine offers various benefits, during pressing, and in particular during tank rotations, dissolution of oxygen is caused by the contact of fermented grapes with the air contained in the press,” explains Kobus. “The oxygen input is massive with up to 2.0 to 5.5 mg/l. The concentration is correlated with the volume and speed of extraction with later pressings having the highest levels of oxygen. This machine is a guarantee of security, and you save on cost and production management.

“Other advantages include a superior quality of press wine thanks to the synergy between the inert system and the selection of pressings, a limitation in oxidative changes of red wines during ageing, which results in better ageing potential, as well as limited microbial deviations (acetic acid bacteria) by reducing gross and uncontrolled oxygen supply to the press wine.

More options with nitrogen generator

Another installation at Du Toitskloof Winery, the Nitrogen Generator, gives the winery the possibility to mix CO2 as well as nitrogen with their application. This innovation gives the winemaker the possibility to choose the ratio between nitrogen and CO2 according to a particular requirement.

“This is the first mixed gas installation in the South African wine industry,” says Kobus. “Currently Beveratech has more than 60 units running and supplying gas in the industry. “Key to this success has been the development of the Maxigas range of gas separation technologies. In particular, the compact, modular and self-contained Maxigas system represents a considerable advance in industrial scale nitrogen generation, providing wineries with a cost effective and practical method of generating their own nitrogen on site, from a conventional supply of compressed air. By providing a high performance and energy efficient system that produces nitrogen on-demand, Maxigas eliminates the need for traditional gas bottles and bulk storage facilities, which are costly, present health and safety issues and typically involve large numbers of freight movements.”

Beveratech also specialises in filtration (cross-flow filtration and reverse osmosis with the Flavy range) with more than 70 cross-flow filters installed in the wine industry.

Beveratech Agri

Beveratech Agri’s new grape harvester with transfer conveyer, grape stripper and sorting table are making headlines around the winelands. With high harvest quality becoming ever more important, this machines offers everything in one.

Schalk le Roux, the man at the steer of all things Agri, explains, “Grape stripping in the vineyard during harvest has been standard practice in Europe for about ten years. For several years now many grape harvesters for the European market have also been equipped with a sorting table. With large vineyard areas, very long rows of vines and high yields, the capacity of the grape bin is not sufficient for the quantity of grapes produced by a row. Grape harvesters with a transfer conveyor solve this problem, but until now did not offer the possibility of stripping the grapes and sorting them. “Ero has developed a grape harvester with transfer conveyor, which can be equipped with both a grape stripper and a sorting table. It is the first grape harvester worldwide to combine all three systems – conveyor transfer, grape stripping and sorting – thus solving many problems facing grape producers.”