Filling of cooled products

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9561946-B2
Application number	US-201313869476-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 24, 2013
Priority date	Apr 24, 2012
Publication date	Feb 7, 2017
Grant date	Feb 7, 2017

Abstract

A method for filling a product. The method including the steps of cooling the product to be filled before or after the introduction of the gas or gas mixture, filling the product to be filled into a filling container, and heating the filled filling container after filling the product to be filled, wherein the cooling and the heating is performed at least partially by means of one heat pump.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method for filling a container with a product, the method comprising the steps of:
cooling the product;
filling the container with the product; and
heating the filled container;
wherein the cooling and the heating is performed by means of a single heat pump; and
wherein a portion of heat produced during the cooling of the product is used to heat the filled container and an excessive portion of the heat produced during the cooling of the product is dissipated by a cooling device connected to the heat pump.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the product contains at least one selected from the group consisting of a gas and a gas mixture.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the product to be filled is a beverage, and/or the container is at least one selected from the group consisting of, a glass bottle, a plastic bottle, a beverage carton and a beverage can.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the heating is additionally accomplished by means of an additional heating device.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein a second portion of heat absorbed by the heat pump during the cooling of the product is used for other process steps.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein further a cooling medium for cooling the product and/or a heating medium for heating the filled container is/are temporarily stored in a buffer storage.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the cooling and the heating is accomplished by means of a plurality of heat pumps at least partially cascading and/or at least partially operated in parallel.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the heating is additionally accomplished by means of at least one selected from the group consisting of a steam generator, hot water, and solar energy.

9. An apparatus for filling a container with a product, the apparatus comprising:
a filler adapted to fill the container with the product;
a single heat pump adapted to cool the product upstream of the filler and heat the filled container downstream of the filler and to use heat produced during a cooling of the product to heat the filled container; and
a cooling device adapted to dissipate a portion of the heat absorbed by the heat pump during cooling.

10. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein the product contains at least one selected from the group consisting of a gas and a gas mixture.

11. The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the filler is adapted to fill a beverage containing at least one selected from the group consisting of a gas and a gas mixture into a container suited for the filling, wherein the container is at least one selected from the group consisting of a glass bottle, a plastic bottle, a beverage carton and a beverage can.

12. The apparatus of claim 9 , further comprising a buffer storage for temporarily storing a cooling medium for cooling the product and/or a buffer storage for temporarily storing a heating medium for heating the filled container.

13. The apparatus of claim 9 , further comprising an additional heating device adapted to heat the filled container additionally.

14. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein the cooling device is further adapted to supply the portion of heat absorbed by the heat pump during cooling to other process steps.

15. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein the heat pump is a heat pump that is operated electrically, by an oil engine or a gas engine.

16. The apparatus of claim 9 , comprising a plurality of heat pumps at least partially cascading and/or at least partially operated in parallel.

17. The apparatus of claim 9 , further comprising at least one selected from the group consisting of a steam generator configured to heat the filled container, hot water configured to heat the filled container, and solar energy configured to heat the filled container.

Assignees

• Krones Ag

Inventors

• Schulz Danilo

Classifications

• B67C3/22 Primary

  Details · CPC title

• B67C3/02 Primary

  Bottling liquids or semiliquids; Filling jars or cans with liquids or semiliquids using bottling or like apparatus · CPC title