FRANKLIN, Vt.—The maple industry may be one step closer to making syrup without boiling sap.

 

In Vermont last season, a 21-year-old sugarmaker was boiling concentrate going into his rig at 41 percent brix, nearly two-thirds of the way to syrup.  

 

It was the first use in the U.S. of so-called superconcentrate.  And it looks to become a trend.

 

“It’s no different than regular syrup,” said Anthony Larivee, of Franklin, Vt. who was the first sugarmaker in the U.S. to buy and use the new “Super Concentrator” from H2O Innovation.

 

Sugarmakers still need a conventional R/O to run sap to 18 or 20 percent; the H2O Super Concentrator takes that concentrate and squeezes it again to a maximum of 45 percent brix, the company says.  

 

“We had a guy in here yesterday who said it was the best syrup he tried all year,” Larivee said on April 9 during a tour for The Maple News.

Larivee, who sugars with younger brother Seth and father Zel, was concentrating 20,000 gallons of raw sap into 800 gallons of 41percent concentrate.

 

From there, the concentrate was boiling in H2O’s finishing rig which features two large finishing pans and no flue pans.  Concentrate is released via a valve (no floats) into a tray the top of the rig and is fed into the first front pan like a waterfall.

 

“It’s nice not having a flue pan to clean up every night,” Larivee said.

 

Meanwhile, at the International Maple Symposium in Quebec City this fall, LaPierre Equipment was showing off its tandem super concentrator R/O and finishing rig. 

 

Lapierre's Carl Lapierre and Jeff Goulet were assuaging a lot of fears about syrup quality by passing out samples of syrup from the high brix rig to conference attendees.

 

Company namesake Donald Lapierre had been experimenting with super high concentrate for the past three seasons before unveiling the company’s new high brix R/O at its annual open house in April.

 

Lapierre’s high brix R/O will take 2 percent sap and run it to 35 percent concentrate in one pass.  The company says that in test after test, there were no detectable flavor issues at that level.

 

For producers, the biggest benefit is energy savings.

 

Larivee says that he is using a tiny fraction of the fuel to run his evaporator, burning only .07 gallons of oil for every gallon of syrup made, compared to at least a half gallon of oil per gallon of syrup on his previous rig.  

 

Larivee only used approximately 300 gallons of oil the entire season.

 

“A lot of people are skeptical about the high brix thinking that the quality of the syrup is degraded,” said Kyle Lothian, Sales Manager of H2O Innovation USA.  “For someone to call this techno syrup is insulting.  H2O would never want to put out a product that would jeopardize what maple is all about.  To me, this is truly innovative.”

 

Larivee has attracted a lot of attention with his neighbors this season, with a steady stream of Franklin County sugarmakers stopping by to taste syrup coming from 41 percent concentrate.

 

‘When everyone comes in they get a sample of our syrup because there is nothing wrong with it,” Larivee said.  “Some were skeptical.  Everyone thinks the syrup would be no good.  I think it’s great.”

 

Larivee doesn’t mind the attention.  In fact, he seems to enjoy it.

 

“I wanted to have a toy nobody else has,” he said.

 

Lothian said he was proud of the syrup coming out of the H2O high brix R/O and finishers.

 

“I think when people taste the syrup they will be quite taken with it,” Lothian said.  “If you want to save serious money in fuel, this is the way to go.”