General information about the sector

The varied climatic and topographic conditions of Europe play a very important role in the production of broad range of fruits and vegetables in the European Union. Typically, southern EU members follow “openair” production, while countries as Belgium and the Netherland have mainly all-season greenhouse production. The two thirds of total production of EU-28 come from Italy and Spain (BREF document "Food, Drink and Milk Industries" (January 2017)).

Fruit and vegetable processing includes many different steps accordingly to the final product characteristics. The present study will focus on the pickling process of vegetables as it is found that it is the process generating most of saline wastewater in fruit and vegetable industry.

Industrial Activity (NACE Code C10.3)

Brine effluent in vegetable processing

Fruit and vegetable processing includes many different steps accordingly to the final product characteristics. Pickling process of vegetables is found to be the process generating most of saline wastewater in fruit and vegetable industry.

The ingredients that are presented in the table are the ingredients that are possible present in the wastewater. That does not necessarily mean that all these ingredients are present in the vegetable saline wastewater.

Due to the high concentration of NaCl or/and CaCl₂ in the pickling liquid, the recovery of NaCl and CaCl₂ can be proposed.

The key parameters for the characterization of pickling wastewater are summarized in the following table.

Main characterization parameters of the saline wastewater stream from pickling process in vegetable industry