@misc{9236784,
  abstract     = {{Fouling is a major problem during heat treatment of dairy and plant-based beverages, leading to increased cleaning demand and production downtime. Conventional cleaning methods rely on chemical detergents (acids and bases), which raise sustainability concerns. A potential cleaning option is the use of enzymes, which has a lower environmental impact.

Plant-based dairy alternatives are increasing in popularity and differ in composition and processing from traditional dairy, yet research on their fouling and cleaning remains limited. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate differences in the quantity and composition of fouling from milk, whey, and oat drink, and explore the possibility of using enzymatic rather than chemical cleaning.

Fouling and cleaning experiments were performed at laboratory scale using a Quartz Crystal Microbalance with Dissipation monitoring (QCM-D) with stainless steel covered sensors to simulate a heat exchanger surface. Fouling deposits were characterized using optical microscopy and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) with Energy-Dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS). Whey protein fouling was further investigated at pilot-scale using a cleaning-in-place (CIP) setup.

It was observed that oat drink generated the greatest amount of fouling, followed by whey, which had marginally more fouling than milk. Milk and whey fouling consisted predominantly of proteins, with some minerals, where more minerals were detected in milk than in whey. In contrast, oat drink fouling was primarily composed of minerals, with fewer proteins. Protease was the only enzyme that provided a cleaning effect, and the optimal enzyme concentration was determined to be 0.5% (v/v) for milk and 0.05% (v/v) for both whey and oat drink.

The enzymatic cleaning outperformed alkaline cleaning for all products. For milk fouling, acid cleaning performed similarly to enzymatic cleaning, but enzymatic cleaning yielded slightly better results, with no additional benefit from combining them. For whey fouling, the cleanest result was obtained with enzymatic cleaning alone, whereas the combination of enzymatic and acid cleaning was most effective for oat drink fouling. For pilot-scale testing of whey fouling, chemical cleaning performed better than enzymatic cleaning.

In conclusion, enzymatic cleaning performed comparably or better than chemical cleaning at laboratory scale. Although further testing and optimization are required for upscaling, the findings show that enzymatic cleaning is a promising approach for more sustainable fouling removal in dairy and plant-based beverage applications.}},
  author       = {{Messering, Nellie and Sommerland, Lovisa}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{Fouling from Dairy and Plant-Based Beverages: Comparison of Chemical and Enzymatic Cleaning}},
  year         = {{2026}},
}