enviro palmtech solutions

OIL RECOVERY & SOLID REMOVAL PLANT FOR RAW SLUDGE by ENVIRO PALMTECH SOLUTIONS SDN. BHD. info@enviropalmtech.com

INTRODUCTION

!!Certain percentage of oil is lost in mesocarp fibre, empty fruit bunches, decanter cake and palm oil mill effluent (POME).

!!These are acceptable losses, as existing technology used in the mill are not able to recover them.

!!0.7-1.0% oil is lost in POME. Any amount < 1.0% is acceptable as unrecoverable oil loss.

!!Oil loss as fine droplets or emulsion state.

!! Mill discharge 3-6% organic solids derived from mesocarp pulp into effluent ponds.

!! Many mills now also recovering oil from EFB and has resulted in EFB juice contributing to ~10% more effluent. But increase BOD up to 2x –from 25,000ppm to 40,000-60,000ppm.

!! Wax from EFB. This is MAJOR problem. !! Together with solid from mesocarp this gives lots of

problem to effluent ponds, reducing retention and digestion time of effluent in ponds, resulting in high BOD and suspended solid discharge to waterways.

!!Ponds sludge up in 1-1.5 year instead of 2.5-3.5 years.

!!Discharge problem of high BOD and suspended solids is due to solids in pond, as it reduces retention time of ponds.

!!Once ponds sludge up, equipment at the discharge point will find it difficult to keep up to handle the load coming through

!!Therefore, the answer is solving the problem upstream – stop the solids from going into the ponds.

ECOTAGZ PLANT

!!with state of the art technology is able to recover all oil and remove all solids from raw sludge before discharged to effluent ponds.

!! Main equipment of ECOTAGZ plant is TAGZ Reactor, a 3 phase decanter and a clarifier.

!!ECOTAGZ Plant will separate raw sludge into 3 products– Oil, decanter cake (solids) and clear filtrate (water)

RAW POME SEPARATED INTO 3 PRODUCTS

=

CLEAR FILTRATE WATER

+

+

OIL DECANTER CAKE SOLID

HEAVY PHASE & STERILISER

CONDENSATE or RAW SLUDGE

Desander

ECOTAGZ

!!Heavy phase coming into ECOTAGZ plant is separated into ORS concentrate and ORS filtrate.

!!ORS Concentrate consist of: oil of about 3-6.0%, solid of 8-9% and the remaining, water.

!!However, quantity depends on amount in raw sludge before going through ECOTAGZ plant.

ORS Concentrate

ORS filtrate is a clear tea like colour liquid which is discharged to the ponds for treatment.

ORS Concentrate will go into a 3 phase decanter to produce light phase, decanter heavy phase and decanter cake.

!! Light phase is channelled to a clarifier where oil is recovered. The ORS clarifier underflow and ORS decanter heavy phase is channelled to TAGZ Reactor for processing again. The solid is removed as decanter cake.

!!ECOTAGZ plant basically recover all oil from raw sludge and remove all solid as decanter cake, discharging a clear filtrate with BOD of 1/4 to 1/3 of original into the effluent pond for treatment.

Oil

!!Pure oil is recovered from clarifier is channeled to the mill oil tank

!!About 90% of oil lost in effluent can be recovered. The 10% is lost via the 3-3.5% in decanter cake.

Solid +

Filtrate

Biogas

Solid +

EFB Fibre

Compost

Discharge

Decanter Cake

Solid Solid +

Inorganic Fert

Fortified Organic Fert

Field Application- wet, dry

or composted

Filtrate

!!The filtrate is a clear tea like color liquid with about 1/4-1/3 of the BOD of original raw sludge.

!!Color of filtrate is due to dissolved organic solids

!!Go to effluent pond for easier treatment to bring down BOD to require spec for discharge.

!!No more solids going into the ponds, so ponds do not get sludge up.

!!Only solids in ponds will be due to dead microbes biomass

!!The dissolved organic solids can easily be digested by microbes

!!TAGZ Reactor comes in module of 15-30mt/hr capacity and the numbers will depends on mill capacity.

!!When ECOTAGZ plant is installed, all oil from decanter heavy phase will be recovered .

!!However, if mill does not have a decanter system, then a 3 phase decanter will need to be installed to handle the mill clarifier underflow and ORS concentrate.

Analysis Result

N o.!

Parameter! Heavy Phase!

Filtrate!

1! BOD3 mg/L! 54,000! 18,000!

2! COD mg/L! 159,000! 37,000!

3! Suspended Solids mg/L!

19,000! 72!

4! Total Solids mg/L! 54,000! 35,000!

5! Ammonical N mg/L! 550! 530!

6! Total N mg/L! 830! 550!

7! Oil & Grease mg/L! 3,200! 7.6!

DISCUSSION Analysis Results !!The two main values that are important is the oil

and suspended solid in the ORS filtrate. !!All analysis shows there is negligible oil

(2-15ppm) and suspend solids (~75ppm) in filtrate.

!!Basically all oil and solids in the raw sludge are retained in ORS concentrate.

Mill Systems

!! For mills with vertical sterilisers, oil loss in steriliser condensate is much higher. However, when this goes to be part of the raw sludge that is processed by ECOTAGZ plant, all oil will be recovered.

!!TAGZ Reactor comes in module of 15-30mt/hr capacity and the numbers will depends on mill capacity.

!!When ECOTAGZ plant is installed, all oil from decanter heavy phase will be recovered.

!!However, if mill does not have a decanter system, then a 3 phase decanter will need to be installed to handle the mill clarifier underflow and ORS concentrate.

!! Its not a critical equipment as it can be by-passed and mill can continue to process crop.

!!ORS filtrate will be easier to treat to bring BOD to require spec for discharge as BOD has reduced to 25-33% of original values.

!!Mill can process more crop without increasing ponds volume. Thus more profit.

!!Esp. for mills without any land to increase ponds !!No more suspended solid to sludge up ponds.

Solids in pond will be due to microbe biomass. !!Effluent ponds will not sludge up easily and there

will be lots of saving from desludging.

Solids & Ponds Conditions

!!Yearly saving of RM200,000 – RM400,000 on desludging.

!!Ponds will retain original design retention time to provide good treatment of filtrate.

!!ECOTAGZ plant will remove wax from EFB juice via decanter cake. Wax sludge up ponds very fast.

!!Option to have no CH4 & H2S gases production in effluent ponds.

!!Provide no CH4 & H2S production in pond by aeration and addition of SAGE Microbe to pond.

!!Aeration will kill Strict Anaerobic Microbes which produces CH4, H2S and other noxious gases.

!! Introduction of SAGE Microbe to digest POME and to bring down BOD.

!!Addition of SAGE microbe into existing pond can reduce BOD further by 25-35%.

Methane Gas Production

Dosing of SAGE Microbe into Pond 3 at 1L/20,000m3

Date on Analysis BOD in ppm

1 21/01/12 88

2 21/02/12 73

3 22/03/12 76

4 17/04/12 Dose SAGE Microbe

5 25/04/12 74

6 18/05/12 54

7 18/06/12 49

8 19/07/12 95

!! Mill environment will have no more foul smell due to H2S.

!! Healthy air. Healthy body. Healthy environment. !! Metal equipment around ponds will not corrode so

fast. H2S + H2O = H2SO4 (sulphuric acid).

!!Mills with biogas or looking into biogas system can mixed up filtrate and decanter cake again to go into biogas plant. It is basically effluent without oil.

!!Decanter cake and filtrate can be blended accordingly to cater to biogas system - that is with more solids.

!! Subsequently, biogas tank can be smaller, or retention time can be longer to give more biogas.

!! Longer digestion means more efficient process and thus lower BOD and solids discharge.

Biogas Capture

!!No more oil discharge into pond. !!No more sludge oil in cooling pond for recovery. !!Oil in heavy phase is recovered in the mill as

crude palm oil with ECOTAGZ plant before discharged to pond.

Sludge Oil

Revenue & Saving

For 60mt/hr mill processing 300,000mt FFB/year with 70% raw sludge, 1% oil loss and 3% solids will recover about 1,870mt oil/year worth RM4.7mil. with CPO at RM2,500/mt. Value at 10 years will be RM47mil. from oil and RM2-4mil saving from desludging. Total saving of RM50mil.

-

2,000,000

4,000,000

6,000,000

8,000,000

10,000,000

12,000,000

14,000,000

16,000,000

14 17 20

30 45 60 75 90 105 120 135 150 R

even

ue in

RM

FFB mt/hr

RM4.7mil

Hrs of operation

Annual Revenue from Oil Recovered from Raw Sludge

Mills will straight away benefits with !!No solids going to the ponds resulting in lower

BOD and Suspended Solids discharge. !!Option to have no CH4 and H2S production from

ponds

Thank You

ENVIRO PALMTECH SOLUTIONS SDN. BHD.