After pressing,extraction method not refined vegetable fats was called crude oil. After crude oil refined to remove vegetable oils impurities,then it can serve as edible oil. Depending on the requirements and purposes, unwanted and harmful impurities are removed from the oil, and get to meet certain standards of quality refined oil is oil refining purposes.
Depending on the operating characteristics and raw material for palm oil, palm oil refining process is mainly used chemical refining and physical refining.
Palm oil chemical refining: is the use of alkali neutralization and removal of most of the free fatty acids in the form of soap, also known as alkali refining process.
Palm oil physical refining: a high temperature and under vacuum conditions of the oil subjected to a steam distillation treatment of the free fatty acids.
Physical refining method has the following advantages: to increase production capacity and refining rates, lower production costs, shorten the processing time and the recovery of high purity can be directly distilled fatty acids. Meanwhile, the physical refining method can also reduce waste water, waste gas problems. Because reprocessing waste water and waste gas produced soap without chemical cleavage after refining.
In recent years, with the continuous improvement process of physical refining methods and equipment, making the advantages of physical refining method has become increasingly evident, the current refining crude palm oil refineries in Malaysia vast majority of the use of physical refining method.
But for the purposes of soybean oil refining, chemical refining method is one of the best in the refining process.
