Membrane Technology in Food Processing

The application of membrane technology in the food and beverage industries increased dramatically in the 1980s. Today, the food industry represents the second biggest worldwide industrial market for membranes after water and wastewater treatment, with a market volume of 800-850 million euro/year. Increase in demand for food and beverages, the high product purity requirements of numerous companies, and availability of diverse fields of application for the membrane technology drive the market. Pressure-driven membrane processes, such as microfiltration (MF), ultrafiltration (UF), nanofiltration (NF), and reverse osmosis (RO) are today well-established operations in a wide range of food and beverage processing on an industrial scale. These processes offer significant advantages in terms of selective fractionation of food products, volume reduction, and product recovery at mild conditions when compared with conventional techniques or as novel technologies for processing new ingredients and foods.