Spotlight: Transforming The Renewable Fuels Industry
Visionary Fiber Technologies Inc. unveils revolutionary clean distillers corn oil (DCO) purification process, offering superior quality and reduced operational costs for ethanol plants. FR technology guarantees technical performance, benefits include reduced carbon intensity and additional revenue stream. Clean DCO enhances market value by $0.045/lb, avoids sorbent-related expenses, and facilitates water recycling, leading to significant operational advantages. Equipment lease option available with no capital outlay, promising increased profitability.
Visionary Fiber Technologies Inc. (VFT) has developed a proprietary distillers corn oil (DCO) purification process utilizing its Fiber Reactor (FR) technology. The improved output, dubbed “clean DCO,” is a new-to-market purity, absent of contaminants that cause catalyst fouling. Technical performance of the technology is guaranteed. There are two full-scale systems currently deployed in Midwestern ethanol plants, with each system having multiple years of demonstrated performance.
Technology Overview
The FR technology utilizes stainless steel fibers to create repeating micrometer-thick ribbons of oil and aqueous solvent. The physical constraints of the reactor allow two immiscible materials to be in intimate contact as the liquids pass through the length of the reactor column. In the case of DCO purification, the FR is a highly efficient medium for aqueous refining.
The technology benefits the end-user with reduced carbon intensity and operating expenses. The FR relies on input material pumps and gravity to move liquids through the reactor, reducing moving parts and maintenance costs.
Value Proposition
The clean DCO from VFT’s FR technology is a superior quality product in the commodity marketplace, with an estimated value lift of $0.045/lb in comparison to currently available-to-market DCO. The FR technology offers an immediate additional operating revenue stream for its end-users via value derived from a new-to-market quality tier of refined DCO. Clean DCO is proven to reduce downstream operational inefficiency related to the fouling of refining catalysts and correlated consumable and maintenance expenses in the RD and SAF markets. Product specifications, shown on the right, are obtained in the absence of centrifugation or physical sorbents such as bleaching clays. As bleaching clays and silica are not used, the associated yield loss and waste disposal costs with sorbents are avoided.
The only consumable in the process is water. During processing, approximately 0.5 mass units of water per mass unit of oil cleaned is used to “wash out” contaminants (which “poison” RD and SAF catalysts) from the DCO. For ethanol plants, this water can be seamlessly recycled back into the ethanol process streams, becoming part of the makeup water for the mash bill. The materials removed from the DCO are minerals that are ultimately deposited into the distillers grains from the plant, thereby having useful sales value. The ability of the ethanol plant to reuse the water, rather than treat it as a wastewater disposal issue, gives a significant operational advantage to cleaning up DCO at the ethanol site. This advantage produces an opportunity for a low-cost value add for ethanol plants that on-site treatment by RD or SAF plants cannot achieve.
Equipment Lease
The FR technology offering is available to ethanol plants in the form of a $0 down lease. Operating lease expenses amount to a monthly revenue share between VFT and end-users, as a variable of revenue lift derived by the lessee in excess of currently available-to-market DCO. The offering structure requires no capital outlay for end-users and results only in an additional income source for the lessee. Recently, crude DCO has experienced a market price decline.
Considering the current DCO value, clean DCO is estimated to enhance marketable price by a delta of more than 10% that of crude DCO.
Source Link : https://ethanolproducer.com/articles/spotlight-transforming-the-renewable-fuels-industry
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