Wendy Warren and Allen Jewett, owners of Paper Moon Roasting in San Jose, California, wanted their new roastery to feature artisan roasting, hence they installed a beautiful Joper BSR-15 Roaster. They also wanted to address environmental responsibility in a city which places a premium on clean air and the use of afterburners.
After careful investigation they discovered the VortX EcoFilter, and having seen it in action, purchased an EF-800 model.
The VortX Ecofilter uses a water-powered cooling system in a conventional roasting cyclone, allowing roasters to precipitate out chaff, smoke, odour, and volatile organic compounds from their exhausts. The water vapour captures the remaining droplets and particulates, bringing them down the cyclone and out the filtration system. The Ecofilter takes significantly less energy and cost to operate than a traditional afterburner.
Following the installation, Wendy and Allen could observe no smoke from ground level and barely smell the roast during their normal roasting process.
To test what was possible with the EcoFilter, Paper Moon Roasting kindly allowed VortX to participate in roasting a full 15-kilogram batch much darker than they would roast, to well past second crack, as can be seen in image 1.
VortX says what was observed was a lot of white steam and the odour of baked coffee, but nothing harsh or repulsive (image 2). This is important to Paper Moon Roasting because there are operable residential windows less than 30 feet (about nine metres) from its stack.
“Thank you Wendy and Allen for your confidence in VortX and for sharing this with the world,” says Ron Kleist, President of VortX Kleanair Systems.
VortX filmed its test with Paper Moon Roasting and will gladly make available the video recording of this to anyone interested.
For more information, visit vortxkleanair.com
