Solvent Extraction
Solvent Extraction is mainly applied to the production of vegetable oil and is fed with vegetable seeds flakes of cakes coming from seed preparation or prepressing .
This process includes:
- Seed Extraction
- Meal Desolventizing and Toasting
- Solvent Evaporation and scrubbing
C.M. BERNARDINI is in a position to supply two different types of extractors:
Belt Extractor
For all kind of oilseeds, particularly those which need high extraction efficiency.
Revolving Extractor :
Double Deck designed to improve the performance of conventional continuous rotary extractors consisting of multi-rotary cell compartments and double floor where material to be extracted is turned out when passing from second to first bed of material to be extracted .
Process design principles and advantages:
- Total counter-current flow
- Level variation for best performance
- Belt speed control
- Self-cleaning screen plates for heavy duty and long life
- Optimized percolation and soaking by maintaining a miscella bath over the product
- Optimized extraction stages, each with several miscella inlets
- Compact design, workshop assembly, easy on-site delivery and erection
Meal desolventizing and toasting
Here, too, CM BERNARDINI can provide with two different options:
- Desolventizer - Cooler
- Desolventizer, toaster, dryer and cooler
The common desolventizer consists of a set of superimposed horizontal trays.
The download flow of the meal from one tray to the next is provided by rotating arms.
An amount of live steam is injected in the various compartments to remove the solvent from the meal completely. This machine is also equipped with dryer-cooler plates.
The DTDC (Desolventizer - Toaster - Dryer - Cooler) allows to obtain desolventizing- toasting-drying and cooling of deoiled meal. Normally it is used for soybean meal.
Advantages are the following:
- High desolventizing efficiency due to the special trays design
- Steam savings due to special level control system on each tray
- Very low residual solvent content in the meal
Solvent evaporation and scrubbing
Removal of solvent from the pre-concentrated miscella is done in two stages . In the first stage (distillation) the solvent is distilled at atmospheric pressure, whereas in the second stage (stripping) it is removed under vacuum. All vents from the various units are conveyed to a pack tower scrubbing system which considerably reduces the hexane concentration going on air.