LPG versus Electricery

[Martin townshend]

Hi,
Might be time for an upgrade. Currently using 2 big LPG burners (C50's i think they are called) to power up my 270 litre kettle. Shut one off at boil for a great rolling boil. Takes 35min to hit boil. Any body else use LPG?
Maybe going to 600litre plus. Anyone got any LPG/electricity rateings/costing comparions?
A concern of mine has always been the waste of energy dissapearing up the ontside of the Kettle. Perhaps a manifold to reduce this? Anyone got a design they may share.
Electricity would need to be 3 phase = extra istallation cost.
Thoughts?
Cheers, M

[JoKing]

I know of a of 600L boil craft brewer who used to use electricity. From memory he used 10kW into the kettle. I use 2kW for 30L boil... doesn't take too long.

Any German brewer would tell you that it's a waste of time using electricity - as it has "no place in a brewery" (real quote btw)... however I have converted a couple of people on here.

Another option is Steam Power? It is probably the most efficient form of energy conversion you can have in a brewery... I couldn't recommend anywhere to get you a 20kW steam boiler though!

[Martin townshend]

Hi Joking,
I use a califont to heat my mash/sparge water, so have no need for a Hot Loquor Tank. Super economical as water at 85 degrees on demand. Fill mash tun and wait for temp to drop to strike whilst milling. Any salts added at mash in. Sparge water comes thru a spray and cools to 74 degrees in the process, so all good there. It's the boil kettle I'm concerned about ad that's the bit I need the info on.
M

[JoKing]

That's what I was talking about - running a series of coils in the bottome of your kettle and running steam generated by a 20kW steam boiler... A lot of breweries are doing this. I visited that little brewery in Tauranga (Brewers Bar?) and he was doing just this.

I also know the Croucher used to have a bad ass electric element to power their old 600L kettle - maybe send Paul a little message and see what he thinks about it?

[Doug]

G'Day Martin,

I'd stick with gas, my brother boils a 1000 ltrs in his brewery in Sydney, I think he's using three burners, the kettle is insulated with glass wool fibre under cladding and the burners are surrounded by brick work to retain and direct the heat. Direct fire is an easy, cheap and efficient way to boil while being low maintenance. For electric you'd probably require around 18 kW configured into two element packs, you could boil on less energy but it's getting up to boil that requires the grunt. They are expensive to purchase, install and replace and they need to be kept very clean. Steam is optimum from an efficiency point however boilers bring their very own level of complexity having to deal with things such as water treatement, steam traps, condensate returns, feed water, dissolved solids, scale etc... you can make a lot of work for yourself trying to achieve what is in effect a very simple process. Lighting a match get's my vote !