Felycia Edi Soetaredjo, Livy Laysandra, Jindrayani Nyoo Putro, Shella Permatasari Santoso, Artik Elisa Angkawijaya, Maria Yuliana, Yi-Hsu Ju, Chun-Hui Zhou, Suryadi Ismadji
A high acidity extent, as a result of the activation process of bleaching earth, is a major drawback in the production of bleached-palm oil. The high acidity of bleaching earth generates problems for the process equipment as well as the product, which are economically disadvantageous. Addressing this pivotal issue in the manufacture, a more environmentally friendly and efficient activation process of bleaching earth using thermal activation is evaluated. Two types of bentonite-bleaching earth collected from two different locations were used throughout this study; that is from Pacitan and Ponorogo, coded as GS and SS, respectively. The effect of the proportion ratio of GS to SS (1:4, 2:3, 3:2, and 4:1), and variations in thermal activation temperature (150, 250, and 350 °C), to the bleaching performance were investigated. Thermal-activation at 150 °C can efficiently activate the bleaching earth without significant cation exchange capacity decrement. The pilot-scale bleaching process demonstrated that the prepared bleaching earth with GS to SS ratio of 3:2 (coded as M-03) could remove 96% of β-carotene from crude palm oil; which is the best among the investigated samples and also higher than the commercial bleaching earth (only 85–90% β-carotene removal). The feasibility of the production of M-03 at the industrial scale was analyzed by scaling up on the pilot scale. M-03 was able to be produced on an industrial scale by using a fluidized-bed dryer; this result has been adapted by a bleaching earth producing factory located in Madiun, Indonesia. Economic analysis on the factory demonstrated a payout time of 2 years and 10 months and the breakeven point of 21.5%. This paper shows the success of bringing the experimental results in laboratory-scale into the industrial-scale production of bleaching earth. © 2020 Elsevier Ltd
Department of Chemical Engineering, Widya Mandala Surabaya Catholic University, Kalijudan 37, Surabaya, 60114, Indonesia; Department of Chemical Engineering, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, 43 Keelung Road, Sec 4, Taipei, 10607, Taiwan; Graduate Institute of Applied Science, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, 43 Keelung Road, Sec 4, Taipei, 10607, Taiwan; Research Group for Advanced Materials & Sustainable Catalysis (AMSC), State Key Laboratory Breeding Base of Green Chemistry-Synthesis Technology, College of Chemical Engineering, Zhejiang University of Technology, Hangzhou, 310014, China; Qing Yang Institute for Industrial Minerals (QYIM), You Hua Township, Qing Yang County, Chi Zhou, 242804, An Hui, China