Scientist Visionary Fiber Technologies Lockhart, Texas, United States
Abstract: High phosphorous content is common in vegetable and animal derived oils/fats. The chemical speciation of the phosphorous is primarily phospholipids. Phospholipids have ionic sites and can attract cations and anions to these ionic sites.
The removal of most metals and anions to low ppm concentration is required for protection of the hydrogenation catalysts for the hydrotreating of vegetable oils. Most commercial hydrogenation catalysts require less than 25 ppm total metals and heteroatom concentration. A two-step process has been developed which shows high effectiveness of removing phospholipids and other inorganic contaminants from vegetable oils. This method is predicated on the removal of the phospholipids. Once the phospholipids are removed the ionic species tend to concurrently “washout” of the oil. This method has been developed and tested on industrially supplied crude soybean oil and crude corn oil with excellent results, as shown in Table 1 and Table 2.
The process uses a catalytically active solid-state reactor to convert phospholipids to water soluble components. Modest amounts of consumable chemicals and wash water are consumed in the process The catalyst rapidly promotes the conversion of lipophilic phospholipids into water soluble components which in turn, partition into the aqueous phase. The subsequent separation process removes the water-soluble components from the oil phase producing oil clean enough for direct hydrotreatment in SAF/RD production.
Significant advantages of this process include: - Simple two-step process for contaminant removal - Reduction/elimination of bleaching clay and silica - Elimination of disc stack centrifuges
