Pilot plant

La planta piloto de AZTI es el espacio donde se reúnen las tecnologías para la mejora de productos y procesos alimentarios, posiblemente, más vanguardistas a nivel europeo. In its almost 1,000 square metres, the pilot plant enables the development of new food products and the validation of emerging new technologies on a pre-industrial scale.

Simulates the production process in the food industry

Planned along the lines of a hygienic design that simulates the overall production process of the food industry, the equipment and technologies the plant is endowed with enable those companies wanting to evaluate a new product (whether in intermediate, semi-finished, prepared, restructured or analogous foods) or a production line on the market may do so without undertaking big investments.

This makes it possible to:

• Test and adjust new food products.
• Validate technologies and machinery in real-world conditions.
• Optimise processes in terms of efficiency, quality and consumption.
• Assess functional ingredients and raw materials.
• Apply sustainability and recovery strategies.
• It has flexible lines for processing, preservation and fermentation, among others, and allows testing under controlled conditions, with specialised technical support.

Integrated services to:

• The food industry (all sectors), to design, develop and validate new processes and technologies as well as new food products. Likewise, it provides assessment in process automation.
• Merchandise and equipment manufacturers. It facilitates the means for validating their technologies in the food sector. To do this, it has reserved a space where they can provisionally incorporate new technologies.

Available technologies

• Technologies for the integral development of intermediate, semi-elaborated, elaborated, restructured and analogous foods.

• Food preservation processes and technologies: Storage chambers, freezing, pasteurization, sterilization processes, surface, packaging and chemical processes.

• Stabilisation processes and technologies: Dehydration, freezing, encapsulation/immobilisation processes.

• Decontamination processes and technologies: Reduction of chemical and biological risks.

• On-line control of products and/or processes.

• Automation for classification.

• Revaluation of residues and by-products.