Efficient Oil Refining Equipment: Principles, Selection, and Optimization
Oil refining equipment is the main equipment used for refining various vegetable oils, such as corn oil, sunflower oil, castor oil, peanut oil, soybean oil, rapeseed oil, walnut oil, tea seed oil, sesame oil, etc. These devices improve the quality and stability of oil through a series of process flows, including degumming, deacidification, decolorization, deodorization, etc.
The following are the main components and process flow of oil refining equipment:
1. Refining pot: used for hydration, degumming, neutralization, and deacidification of fats and oils. Hydration degumming mainly involves adding water and phospholipase to combine impurities such as phospholipids with water to form precipitates, which are then separated by centrifugation. Neutralization and deacidification refers to the use of edible grade alkaline solution neutralization method to remove free fatty acids, acidic pigments, sulfides, insoluble impurities, and trace metals from oil.
2. Bleaching pot: used for adsorption and decolorization of fats and oils. Crude oil contains pigments such as chlorophyll and carotenoids, which not only affect the appearance of the oil, but may also affect its stability. Therefore, it is necessary to use adsorbents such as clay, aluminum silicate, activated carbon, etc. to remove various pigments, resins, oxides, etc. from the oil.
3. Deodorization pot and deodorization tower: used for high-temperature distillation to remove odors from fats and oils. There are some unwanted odorous substances in fats, mainly derived from lipid oxidation products. By high-temperature distillation, these odorous substances can be removed and the flavor of the oil can be improved.
4. Filter: Used to remove impurities and decolorizing agents from fats and oils. During the refining process, some chemical reagents and adsorbents will be added, and these substances need to be removed at the end. The filter can separate these impurities and decolorizing agents from the oil to obtain finished oil.
In addition, there are also some auxiliary equipment, such as vacuum units, steam generators, etc. The vacuum unit is used to generate negative pressure vacuum, which helps to decolorize and deodorize fats. A steam generator is used to heat water to produce steam, which is supplied to equipment for distillation.
The price of oil refining equipment depends on the degree of refining treatment required by the customer, daily processing capacity, equipment materials, etc. The higher the degree of oil refining, the more process steps are required, and the higher the equipment cost.