Alfa Laval D3 PRO

ALFA LAVAL D3 PRO 3-PHASE OIL RECOVERY PROCESS

How much would you save in a year if you can recover oil for an additional of 0.1% to FFB/hr?

Most plant managers today are calling for a more sustainable crude palm oil process that can recover more oil, minimize costs and optimize yield. To achieve all the requirements to meet the challenges and at the same time be profitable in one process may sound too good to be true. But what if Alfa Laval could break this myth by improving the absolute oil loss of 0.1% to FFB/hr?

The Alfa Laval D3 PRO process is a revolutionary design that takes all the challenges nowadays into consideration, to bring performance beyond current practice. Needless to say, the success does not come naturally. Alfa Laval has been involved in the palm oil industry for decades and it was only after countless of meetings with plant managers, operators and consultants, they have now an answer to the demands of process that is less in cost, produces more oil and minimum effluent.

The D3 PRO improves your process and saves you money right from the start. That is because Alfa Laval system requires no dilution water. With its patented feed zone, Alfa Laval 3-phase decanter can separate undiluted crude oil, even at high capacity. This represents significant savings in time, energy consumption, water usage and labor.

How Does D3 PRO Work?

Unlike the traditional 2-phase system, D3 PRO can avoid oil loss by going through the third phase to recover oil from the heavy phase. It is estimated that the average plant loses 0.40% of oil to FFB in the separation process. With the D3 PRO, however, the heavy phase is sent to our high speed, disk stack centrifuge where oil is recovered and re-routed in the system.

This step in the process can amount to significant increases in yield and profit. For instance, if a plant processes 250,000 tons/year and recovers an additional 0.1% of oil to FFB, the amount of recovered oil will be 250 mt. If one metric tonne of oil is valued at USD 920, this represents an additional revenue of USD 230,000 per year.

Maximum Oil Recovery

Sengfook Liew, Separation Manager, SEA Competency Centre, who was actively involving in the R&D of D3 PRO, had an ideal oil recovery room in his mind.

“An effective oil clarification room should be able to achieve maximum oil recovery, meaning that there shall be lowest oil loss, be simple to operate, give consistent results and minimize effluent discharge. This is the basic requirement for a good oil recovery system.”

“In the palm oil mills’ environment, any system introduced must be easy to operate and not require highly skilled personnel. The remoteness of most mills and the difficulty of acquiring skilled workers is constantly a problem.”

Alfa Laval’s D3 PRO combined clarification, purification and oil recovery process has been adopted by numerous crude palm oil mills across the world with a total capacity of 80 tons FFB/h.

The D3 PRO Allows You To :

“Furthermore,” said Liew, “the system must also be able to tolerate the fluctuation of the composition of the press liquor. The composition varies depending on the fruit type, seasonal changes and upstream processing conditions e.g temperature, water addition etc. So it is imperative that any clarification system introduced must be able to cater for these fluctuations and still be able to produce consistently low oil losses results.”

Minimum Effluent

“Not to forget the handling and treatment of effluent discharge. It posed one of the biggest challenges to the industry. With a concerted push • Recover lost oil for higher yields and profit • Separate without dilution water • Reduce effluent by up to 30% • Create a light phase with no need for additional purification

• Operate at high capacity • Create cake for other income sources such as fertilizer

• Save space and money by eliminating a continuous vertical settling tank from your process

• Reduce water, energy and labour costs • Minimize maintenance and man-hours

• Separate crude palm oil 24 h/d • Consistent separation and oil quality • No unnecessarily long holding time and exposure to oxidation

oil recovery provides numerous advantages over traditional 3-phase systems and most current 2-phase models for crude palm oil. It is available with different capacity from 30 to 90

Alfa Laval 3-phase decanter

tons fresh fruit bunches (FFB)/hour.

The main workhorse of this process is our 3-phase decanter, capable of high capacity separation with no need for dilution water. This means considerably less effluent for smaller, more manageable ponds. It helps to reduce water consumption and effluent by up to 30%. by environmental regulating agencies,

be used for additional sources of income. mills have to ensure that the effluent from the mills are properly controlled and treated. If the amount of effluent can be minimized it will go a long way to mitigate this problem.”

“The Alfa Laval’s new D3 PRO clarification system is designed with the above points in mind. It has been tested and operated for more than a year in a commercial mill and the results have been most promising. It is our effort to manageable in today’s competitive palm

design a system that can fulfill these demanding requirements.”

About D3 PRO

The D3 PRO process for combined

The process produces a light phase that is “ready-to-go” with no need for further purification. At the same time, the heavy phase can be further separated to recover oil and a cake phase that can

D3 PRO can be designed to be a selfautomated system capable of operating 24 hours a day, with minimal maintenance or supervisory requirements

It all adds up to a system that can make your plant more profitable and clarification and purification and

oil industry.