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Nitrogen (N2) gas is used to purge air from many non-carbonated beverages, increases container rigidity and produces an inert headspace blanket above the product. Inert N2 gas greatly increases the shelf-life of air-sensitive products by protecting flavors and other air-sensitive ingredients from oxidative degradation.
The grade of N2 used for beverages must be highly pure, oxygen-free and not have any foreign impurities that would either decrease product shelf life or impart any undesired sensory effects.
Two sources of nitrogen are used for beverage applications. These include: N2 from cryogenic distillation and “nitrogen-enriched air” whereby a compressed air - N2 diffusive membrane unit is used to generate purified N2 gas. Each source has potential impurities that must be monitored to ensure trouble-free use in air-sensitive bev-products.
ALI is experienced in performing bev-grade N2 purity testing and is actively working to produce ISBT quality guidelines for bev-grade N2 use.
We offer for rental or purchase both high pressure sampling cylinders and a special “No-Haz” N2 sampling - shipping kit for convenient sampling of your N2 gas and shipment to us for quality testing.
Our “No-Haz” N2 sampling kit offers an important advantage because many bottlers are not “hazmat certified” and so cannot legally ship a high pressure N2 sample cylinder. In many cases, even hazmat-qualified gas producers find it costly and difficult to ship high pressure N2 cylinder samples, especially internationally due to security issues. Our “No-Haz” N2 sampling kit, however, allows you to take a small, low pressure N2 sample and properly ship it as a non-hazardous commodity of no commercial value! Each kit comes with a set of simple pictorial sampling & shipping instructions.
Please contact us if you have any questions about our bev-grade N2 testing programs or products.
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