INTERNATIONAL CLEANER PRODUCTION INFORMATION CLEARINGHOUSE

CASE STUDY #78

1.  Headline: Integrated technology improvements in the
production of hydrogenated oil

2.  Background: The environmental impacts become more serious
as production expands. The amount of waste water allowed to be
discharged into the city sewage system is less than 500 cubic
meters per day and COD concentration in the waste water is
restricted to no more than 300 milligram per litre. Actually
the amount of waste water discharged after treatment is  600
cubic meters per day and the COD concentration in it is about
600 milligram per litre. The daily quantity of this polluted
wastewater prevents any further production expansion. There
was a plan to expand the waste water treatment plant (which
would be a 2 million RMB Y investment), which has been delayed
due to lack of funds.

It would be possible to expand production activity by reducing
wastes generation at its source and by improving the links
between environmental and economic benefits. The Shaoxing
Cereal & Oil Factory (SCOF) hopes to reduce wastes generation
and to lower material consumption through a cleaner production
audit program.

SCOF is a medium-sized food processing company and is one of
the key enterprises in Shaoxing with 471 employees (12 percent
of whom are technical).  SCOF is located on the west side of
the city and occupies 50,000 square meters.  It produces a
broad variety of products, such as 3,000 tons of man made
cream, 5,000 tons of edible hydrogenated oil, 5,000 tons of
beer and 3,000 tons of cold foodstuff. Now the fixed assets of
the factory amount to 19 million RMB Y and the production
value is 30 million RMB Y annually.

3.  Cleaner Production Principle:

4.   Description of Cleaner Production Application: The
     company set up one cleaner production audit team headed
     by the company manager and 3 subworking groups which were
     in charge of waste auditing, option generation and option
     feasibility studies, respectively.  The hydrogenated oil
     unit of the plant was selected as the focus for the audit
     after all unit operations had been reviewed and in light
     of the short and medium-term cleaner production targets
     that had been created. To encourage all employees to take
     part in the cleaner production activity, 100 copies of
     questionnaires about cleaner production issues were
     distributed to collect opinions and suggestions.  Eighty-
     two copies were returned. Twenty-four options were
     generated after analyzing and summarizing these
     suggestions, of which 13 options were identified as non
     and low cost ones. Twelve of these 13 options were
     implemented and obvious economic benefits were achieved.
     From September to December of 1993, total economic
     benefits amounted to 78,000 RMB Y.  COD emissions were
     reduced by 14.86 tons leading to a reduction of 1.92 tons
     in waste water discharge and an increase of 7.93 tons in
     oil recovery.

Enabling technology: The integrated technology improvements of
hydrogenated oil production (hydrogenating, alkaline refining
and decolorizing and deodorizing) will use "DeadEnd Type"
hydrogenation techniques and equipment.  The new technique has
the following characteristics:

(1) adding oil dewatering equipment
(2) adding a stirring machine in the hydrogenation reactor to
realize high pressure hydrogenation, and
(3) installing flowmeters between equipment to strengthen
control of input/output quantity of oil and hydrogen.

Alkaline Refining Section will replace the separating
equipment and add process control instruments for the
decolorizing and deodorizing processes.

5.  Economics:

Oil loss: from 5.73% down to 2.71%
Catalyst consumption: from 3.2kg down to 2.26kg per ton of oil
other raw materials
Consumption: some kinds of reduction

The annual economic benefits are as follows:
                                        RMB Y

Raw materials savings:                  263,500
(raw materials, water, catalyst, hydrogen gas, etc.)
Oil recovery:                         568,900
Waste water reduction:                  415,500
Oil output increasing:                  580,000
Oil quality improving:                   2,000,000

Operation cost added:                      340,000

        Total                         3,487,900

The total investment of the integrated technology improvements
is 10.182 million RMB Y.  The payback period is 3.9 years and
the internal rate of return is 22.36%.

6.  Advantages:   Environmental benefits from carrying out
the integrated technology improvements are as follows:

    COD emission reduction: 302 tone per year
    Cooling water reduction: 28.02 cubic meter per ton of oil
    Water reduction: 30.42 cubic meter per ton of oil

7.  Constraints: N/A

8.  Contacts:Mr. Renfei Fu, engineer
            Shaoxing Cereal & Oil Factory
            25 West Guomishi Street
            Shaoxing Zhejiang Province
            Zip Code: 312000
            China
            Tel: +86 575 515 7146
            Fax: +86 575 5156961

9.  Keywords:China, Foodstuff production

10.  Reviewer's Comments:  This case study was taken from the
     document:  "Cleaner Production in China," published by the
     National Environmental Protection Agency of China.  It was
     edited for the ICPIC diskette in August 1995, but has not
     undergone a formal technical review.