Operation of an electroporation device for mash

In the course of the production of red wine the electroporation of mash enables a fast extraction of the red pigments from the skin without remarkable heating of the mash. For white wine the formation of pores in the cells fosters among others the extraction of flavouring substances. To demonstrate and further investigate these advantages the mobile electroporation device KEA-WEIN has been built. During the harvest in 2008 the electroporation device KEA-WEIN has been operated successfully in two wineries. All together more than 5 m³ of mash has been treated. The electroporation device KEA-WEIN is equipped with a 6-stage Marx-generator operating at a repetition rate of up to 20 Hz. For the pulse application the mash is pumped through an electroporation reactor with a homogeneous field distribution. It was the aim of this year´s experiments to gain some experience in the operation of the electroporation device on-site in a winery. To facilitate the evaluation of the experimental results, the electroporation device has been equipped with different sensors and measurement systems, e.g. for the power drawn from the grid, the temperature of the mash before and after the electroporation, and the throughput. A computer interface enables a continuous data logging. The paper presents and discusses the measurement results and experience gained during operation.