Hygiene and cleanliness are two critically important aspects of any food production line that processes raw meat, produce, baked goods, etc. All it takes is just one minor lapse in sanitation to trigger a snowball effect that will negatively affect the health of consumers as well as the reputation and sales of the manufacturer.

While there are several sanitation methods you can use, the Clean In Place (CIP) food conveyor cleaning system offers the most benefits and bang for your buck. It’s a highly effective cleaning process that sanitizes food conveyor belts, reduces downtime, and decreases manual labor requirements. Read on to learn more about the benefits of using a CIP system for your food processing line.

What is Clean In Place?

The CIP process provides an extremely high level of sanitation that eliminates the need to remove the conveyor belts and associated parts when cleaning. This significantly cuts down on labor requirements while decreasing the overall time it takes to decontaminate a conveyor belt to meet stringent safety regulations.

Food processors use different types of chemicals to kill pathogens when sanitizing the conveyor belt. However, a bio-film still remains—it consists of surface-associated microbial cells enclosed in an extracellular polymeric substance matrix. This mish-mosh of organic material can contain many different types of bacteria, fungi, algae, debris, protozoa, and corrosive materials.

The only effective way to completely eradicate the biofilm is to utilize a mechanical scrubbing action. This mission-critical task often falls to the cleaning crew, who scrub the conveyor belt by hand. The trouble with this method is that it creates many opportunities for missed spots due to human error and fatigue.

The CIP cleaning method was created as a response to the need to keep downtime to a bare minimum while ensuring 100% sanitation levels. When food processors opt for a CIP system, it helps to ensure that they save time and money without compromising the quality and safety of their products.

Benefits of a CIP System

In addition to saved time and money, there are several other notable benefits of utilizing a CIP system to sanitize your food processing conveyor belts:

Improved Sanitation—CIP systems offer far greater sanitation than other cleaning methods. However, best safety practices dictate that you should continue to test for pathogens, regardless of your sanitation processes.

Consistency—Using manual labor to sanitize can exponentially increase contamination risks due to human error and fatigue. A CIP system, on the other hand, cleans accurately and consistently.

Employee Safety—Employees risk getting injured when taking apart a conveyor belt system for sanitation. There’s less of a chance of an industrial accident occurring while utilizing a CIP system because workers aren’t disassembling the conveyor and working around machinery that might not be properly tagged out.

The Brite Belt CIP System