Nancy Shang | Founder & CEO, MICET | Updated July, 2026
Commercial cellars split fermentation and conditioning across two vessels: a jacketed conical fermenter for active fermentation, and a pressure-rated brite tank for carbonating and holding finished beer. A unitank folds both jobs into one shell. Which setup fits depends on your batch cadence, floor space, and how often a full fermenter is your actual bottleneck.
Fermenter, Brite Tank, or Unitank: Which Vessel Solves Which Problem?
A fermenter does one job well: it holds wort through active fermentation, manages the CO2 and krausen that come off a working batch, and lets you crop yeast from the cone. A brite tank does a different job — it clarifies, carbonates, and stores beer that’s already done fermenting, right up until it’s kegged, canned, or poured. A unitank is built to do both in sequence, in the same shell, which is why it shows up most often in taprooms and pilot systems where floor space costs more than tank flexibility.
The mistake procurement teams make is treating these as interchangeable stainless cylinders that differ only in size. They don’t. A fermenter’s cone geometry, its pressure-reducing valve, and its glycol jacket zoning are built around fermentation kinetics — heat load rising and falling as yeast works through the wort. A brite tank’s jacket and port layout are built around a steadier, colder hold and a clean carbonation path. Buying one to do the other’s job usually means retrofitting fittings you didn’t budget for.
Vessel Comparison at a Glance
| Vessel | Primary job | Pressure role | Jacket coverage | Typical capacity range |
| Conical fermenter | Primary/secondary fermentation, yeast cropping | Manages fermentation off-gas via pressure-reducing valve, not full serving pressure by default | Glycol jacket, typically cone + lower shell | 500L–2500L; 40BBL–60BBL on the large end |
| Brite (bright) tank | Clarify, carbonate, hold finished beer | Rated for carbonation and serving pressure | Full-shell or upper-shell glycol jacket | 1BBL–300BBL, common models 10BBL–60BBL; 3000L horizontal units also used |
| Unitank | Fermentation, then carbonation, in the same shell | Needs a pressure rating that covers both fermentation off-gas and serving pressure | Full jacket, since it runs both cycles | Varies by supplier — no standalone spec sheet in MICET’s published catalog as of this writing |
CIP path matters as much as capacity. A fermenter’s conical bottom needs a spray pattern that reaches the cone angle without dead zones; a brite tank’s straighter shell is faster to clean precisely because it has fewer internal geometry changes. Ask any supplier for the CIP cycle time at your actual tank size, not a generic “under 30 minutes” claim — cycle time scales with shell height and port count.
Conical Fermenters: Specs and What the Numbers Mean
MICET’s fermentation tank line runs 500L, 600L, 700L, 800L, 1000L, and 2000L on the small-to-mid end, up to 2500L, and separately 40BBL, 50BBL, and 60BBL sizes for larger cellars. Shells are SUS304 stainless, with some specification pages listing a 304/316 combination for buyers who want the extra corrosion margin on the wetted surfaces. The tanks are built for beer, wine, cider, and kombucha — the same cylindrical-conical shape works across all four, since the underlying need is the same: settle solids to a cone, pull them off cleanly, control temperature through a glycol jacket, and keep the vessel closed during active fermentation.
A common misreading: buyers assume any conical fermenter with a pressure-reducing valve is rated to hold beer at full carbonation pressure the way a brite tank is. It isn’t, by default. The pressure-reducing valve on a fermenter is there to bleed off fermentation CO2 safely, not to certify the vessel for the higher, steadier pressure a brite tank holds during carbonation and serving. If you plan to carbonate in the fermenter itself — effectively running it as a unitank — get the pressure rating in writing before you order, not after.
Edge case worth flagging: barrel-program and high-gravity brewers often need extended dry-hop or maturation time in the same vessel, which ties up a fermenter for two to four times longer than a standard ale cycle. If your production mix includes these styles, size fermenter count around your longest-occupancy batch, not your average one — otherwise the schedule looks fine on paper and breaks the first time a barrel-aged batch runs long.
Brite Tanks: Specs for Carbonating and Holding Beer
The brite tank range spans 1BBL up to 300BBL, with the most common commercial models at 10BBL, 15BBL, 20BBL, 25BBL, 30BBL, 35BBL, 40BBL, 50BBL, and 60BBL, plus a 3000L horizontal option for cellars with height restrictions. Shells are food-grade 304/316 stainless. Their job in the process is narrower than a fermenter’s — store and carbonate — which is part of why the CIP path is simpler and turnaround between batches is usually faster.
One trade-off worth stating plainly: adding a dedicated brite tank is additional capital and floor space you don’t need if you’re kegging straight from the fermenter at low volume. For a nano brewery packaging a few kegs a week, a brite tank can sit mostly empty between uses. It earns its cost once you’re running enough weekly volume that a fermenter tied up for conditioning becomes the vessel blocking the next brew day — which is the throughput question the next section walks through.
Unitanks: One Shell, Two Jobs
A unitank runs fermentation first, then transitions the same vessel into a conditioning and carbonation role once fermentation activity drops off. The appeal is straightforward: fewer vessels, less floor space, fewer transfer lines to clean and maintain. The constraint is just as straightforward — you cannot start the next fermentation in that tank until the current batch is packaged out and the vessel is fully cleaned and inspected. Two dedicated vessels let you ferment batch two while batch one is still conditioning in brite; one unitank can’t do both at once.
MICET’s published catalog lists fermentation tanks and brite tanks as separate product lines rather than a standalone unitank spec sheet. If a unitank specifically — not a fermenter and brite tank pair — is what your project needs, request a written specification and pressure rating for that configuration before comparing it against a two-vessel setup on cost per barrel of annual throughput.
Size Your Cellar in Four Steps
- Log how many days each fermenter sits idle after fermentation activity ends but before the batch is fully packaged and the tank is cleaned for the next brew.
- Separately log how often finished beer sits in a fermenter because your brite tank (or serving line) is occupied by an earlier batch.
- Compare the two numbers. If fermenters are the ones sitting idle, the constraint is fermentation capacity — add fermenters or shorten cycle time. If beer is backing up waiting on brite, the constraint is downstream, and a unitank won’t fix it since it still ties up one shell per batch.
- Size any new vessel against your longest-occupancy SKU, not your average batch — a single barrel-aged or lagered product can occupy a tank three to four times longer than your standard ale program, and that batch is usually what breaks a schedule built on averages.
Pressure Certification: What Paperwork to Request
Ask for the actual pressure equipment verification, not a generic “CE certified” line on a spec sheet. MICET’s brewing and fermentation equipment carries a PED Verification (certificate 3N231110.SICS093) issued by Ente Certificazione Macchine Srl under the EU’s 2014/68/EU Pressure Equipment Directive, tested to EN 1626:2008, issued November 2023 and valid through November 2028. A separate Verification of Conformity (ICR/VC/HM2507146) from ICR Co., Ltd. covers brewery, brewing, and fermentation equipment as pressure vessels under the same PED framework, referencing EN 1626:2008 and EN 10204:2004, issued July 2025 and valid through July 2030.
Neither document is a substitute for a signed pressure rating on your specific tank order. What they establish is that the manufacturer’s pressure vessel design and testing process has been checked by an accredited third party, not that every individual tank ships with that exact certificate number attached — ask the supplier to confirm which certification applies to the specific model and wall thickness you’re ordering.
What These Systems Cost
Full microbrewery systems — brewhouse plus supporting tanks in the 30BBL–60BBL production range — run 30,000 to 80,000 USD, and commercial systems built around a 10BBL minimum brewhouse start around 50,000 and run to 80,000 USD, according to MICET’s published pricing. Standalone fermenter, brite tank, or unitank pricing outside those bundled systems is not published; get a quote against your specific capacity, port configuration, and jacket zoning, since those three variables move the price more than the base shell size does.
Compared to homebrew-scale single-vessel setups that dominate a lot of the search results on this topic, commercial fermenter and brite tank pricing is driven by pressure documentation, weld inspection records, and CIP automation level — not just liters of capacity. That’s also why a spec sheet without a pressure rating attached is worth treating as incomplete, not just brief.
MICET has built more than 1,000 installations across 100+ countries over 16+ years in brewery equipment manufacturing, running a 10,000-square-meter factory with engineers averaging 22 years of experience and 24/7 after-sales support.
FAQ
Q: Can I convert an existing fermenter into a brite tank?
A: Only if the shell’s pressure rating and port layout already support carbonation and serving pressure. Retrofitting a carbonation stone onto a fermenter that wasn’t rated for that pressure is a certification problem, not just a plumbing one — check the rating first.
Q: Do small breweries need a brite tank at all?
A: Not always. Breweries kegging directly from the fermenter at low weekly volume can skip it. The tank earns its cost once fermenter turnaround, not brite capacity, becomes your scheduling constraint.
Q: What pressure rating should I request for a unitank?
A: One that covers both fermentation off-gas management and full carbonation/serving pressure, since the same shell handles both cycles. Get that rating in writing against the specific model, not the product line in general.
Q: How much longer does CIP take on a unitank versus a separate fermenter and brite tank?
A: It depends on port count and shell geometry more than on which type it is, but a unitank’s CIP cycle has to account for both fermentation residue and conditioning residue in one pass, which typically extends cycle time compared to cleaning a brite tank alone.
Q: What lead time should procurement plan for?
A: MICET does not publish a fixed lead time figure; request a written timeline against your specific capacity and configuration, since custom port layouts and jacket zoning affect fabrication schedule.