Abstract: A method of processing fermented liquid comprising(a) feeding said fermented liquid into a vacuum vaporizer, (b) heating the feed in said vaporizer to separate it into a vapor and a concentrated liquid fraction, (c) recycling said vapor to said vaporizer by compression so as to achieve heat-exchange with said feed therein thereby generating a new vapor and a condensate fraction; said condensate being discharged as a distillate, (d) supplying the remaining compressed vapor to a multistage distilling column, (e) separating said compressed vapor into two fractions, one with a higher boiling point than the other, within said distilling column, (f) condensing said distillate with the lower boiling point to yield an alcohol-rich distillate, and (g) discharging said fraction with the higher boiling point as a bottom residue, and a processor therefor, thereby discharging to the outside the low COD-liquid alone and recovering useful substances such as drinkable alcohol, livestocks feed and antibiotic substances.

Abstract: A method and an apparatus providing a simple and speedy determination of a slight amount of sulfurous acid contained in liquids by means of pH meters, based on the Modified Rankine's method in principle, and wherein the pH of a first sample of liquid is determined before and after adding an amount of hydrogen peroxide thereto, the pH of a second sample of liquid is determined before and after adding an amount of an acid or lower pH buffer solution thereto, and the concentration of sulfurous acid in the liquid is calculated from the measured pH values and an equation derived from the functional relationship:c=f(.DELTA.pH.sub.A, .DELTA.pH.sub.B)wherein c is the concentration of sulfurous acid.