Biodiesel-making machinery and equipment sourcing in China

We just offered a one-stop sourcing service for a client from Africa for their bio-diesel project, covering design, equipment and machinery sourcing, shipping and installation etc. Henan, Shandong, Hebei etc have the best oil-processing equipment and technology etc in China at the moment, especially the equipments from Henan, they account for more than 50% of the whole China market.

What is biodiesel ?
Biodiesel is an alternative fuel similar to conventional or‘fossil'diesel.Biodiesel can be produced from straight vegetable oil, animal oil/fats, tallow and waste cooking oil. The process used to convert these oils to biodiesel is called transesterification.

What are the raw materials of bio-diesel production ?
A variety of oils can be used to produce biodiesel. These include:
Virgin oil feedstock- palm oil, rapeseed and soybean oils are most commonly used.
Used cooking oil (UCO);
Waste vegetable oil (WVO);
Animal fats - tallow, lard, yellow grease, chicken fat etc;

How to make biodiesel ? 
The process of making biodiesel is known as transesterification. This process is achieved by adding methanol to vegetable oil. The process requires a catalyst to increase the rate of the chemical reaction between the methanol and vegetable oil. The catalyst used in the creation of biodiesel is an alkaline. Biodiesel production is the process of producing the biofuel, biodiesel, through the chemical reactions of transesterification and esterification. This involves vegetable or animal fats and oils being reacted with short-chain alcohols. The alcohols used should be of low molecular weight.

What is the process of biodiesel production ?
In China, from the used cooking oil to the bio-diesel, you need at least 5 processing phases:
Pretreatment;
Esterification:
Methanol Distillation;
Transesterification;
Methyl Ester Distillation;

What machinery and equipment does biodiesel-making need ? 
To complete above processing, you need lots of processing machinery and equipments like pumps, tanks, heaters, coolers, detectors, drying towers, condensers, distributors, degassers, oil collectors, evaporators, reactors, heat exchangers, kettles, drying column, lye pots, reboilers etc. All above equipment and machinery can be sourced in China.

Where and how to source oil-processing equipments in China ?
China is the largest manufacturing bases for oil-processing equipment on the globe at present. It claims to have more than 1000 equipment oil-processing manufacturers scattering over 20 provinces and areas in Mainland China, among them, Henan, Shandong, Hebei, Helongjiang, Jilin etc account for 70% of the whole China market.

If you need sourcing support in bio-diesel production, please feel free to contact us for details, STIN group is offering a one-stop sourcing solution service for your bio-diesel project in China. 

Source: STIN SOURCING TEAM 

How and where to find qualified UCO suppliers from China

     China, thanks to her huge population and peculiar cooking ways, currently produces more than 3.7 million tons of waste oils per year, which is 2.13 times the number of total waste oils made in European Union, the U.S. and Canada. 

    As of Dec 31, 2018, China exported 581164 tons of used cooking oil from Jan, 2018 (the whole year) based on the data from China Customs,the total export volume increased around 69% compared with the previous year. During the first quarter of 2019, China exported 121748 tons of used cooking oil，China is expected to export more than 600000 tons of UCO by the end of 2019. Guangdong, Hebei, Sichuan, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shandong, Hunan province etc contributed heavily to the whole export. 

    In China,the main sources of bio-diesel feedstocks are UCO (covering used rapeseed oil, used sunflower seed oil, used peanut oil, used palm oil and other used vegetable oils), gutter oil, spent bleaching clay oil and acid oil. As for the UCO, it only accounts for around 42% of all waste oils. All these waste oils will be further processed, refined, and then exported to Europe in name of 'Industrial Blend Oil', so actually the term (word)‘UCO’we discussed in this topic is NOT referring to the‘pure’used cooking oil, it is referring to a kind of blend oils for industrial purpose. We call it‘Industrial Blend Oil’in China, which is a mix of used cooking oil, gutter oil or other wastes.

     In China each province has their own policies or regulations on the management of waste oils, in regard to the UCO manufacturing bases, currently Sichuan, Hebei, Guangdong are the top 3 in China. Hebei claims to have the most UCO plants in China, particularly around Shijiazhuang City. Lots of UCO from North China, covering Beijing, Tianjin,Inner Mongolia etc, has flowed into Hebei area.Shandong has the largest refining capacity with most oil refiners (refineries), they mainly collect UCO from central and eastern China.Sichuan has been a major UCO refining base in western China since 2015 due to their unique cuisine habit. Sichuan is the home of hotpot food, in which lot of cooking oils are used. That's why they have more UCO than other provinces in China.Guangdong is next to South China Sea, and it has been the largest UCO exporter in China since 2016 thanks to its convenient transportation by sea.

    Here are the main UCO collectors with ISCC certificates and their locations here in Mainland China at present.

      As for the export destination, currently Netherlands is the largest export destination for China UCO, accounting for around 60.5% of all China UCO export in the first half of 2019. Korea comes next, followed by Spain, Hongkong, Thailand, and UK. Please contact us for further information when necessary.

STIN Group: China to be the largest exporter for used cooking oil in the coming 5 years

Around 10 factories in China has obtained ISCC EU certificate as of today,even one supplier in Anhui exported 100000 containers of waste cooking oil within only one month last year.

China used cooking oil is the best raw material for bio-diesel production in Europe.

STIN UCO, short for STIN UCO RENEWABLE ENERGY CO. LTD is a part of STIN GROUP, STIN UCO focuses exclusively on the business of Used Cooking Oil, covering the collection, refinement, development, processing, manufacturing and export of all kinds of used cooking oil in China. STIN UCO factory is located in Shenze county, Hebei province, we have used cooking oil collectors working for us in Beijing, Chengdu, Sichuan, Henan and Shandong etc
    
      STIN UCO factory has been certified with ISCC and STIN UCO is striving to be the largest UCO collector, producer and exporter in the coming 5 years. STIN UCO has been successfully exported tens of thousands of containers of UCO to UK and European market so far. STIN UCO factory is able to collect and produce around 5000 -- 10000 tons per month at present, depending on the specific product details from the clients worldwide. 

Here are the regular used cooking oil indexes (specifications) that we are exporting to European market at present:  

 

1.FFA (free fatty acids): 5% Max

M&I (moisture and impurities): 2% Max

Iodine Value (IV): Min 80 G IOD/100G

Sulphur Content: Max 30 MG/KG

 

2.FFA 5% max

M.I. 2% max

IV 85 min

Sulphur 50ppm max

 

3.Free Fatty Acids - max 5%, 

Impurities - max 1%

Water - max 1%

Sulphur - max 50 ppm

Idoine Value min 85+

Polyethylene max 50ppm

 

4.FFA (free fatty acids): 3% Max

M&I (moisture and impurities): 2% Max

Iodine Value (IV): Min 80 G IOD/100G

Sulphur Content: Max 30 ppm

Water content: 1% Max

Insoluble substances: 1% Max

Unsaponifiable: 1% Max

Polyethylene (PE): 50 ppm Max

 

5. FFA (free fatty acids): 2% Max

M&I (moisture and impurities): 1% Max

Iodine Value (IV): Min 75 G IOD/100G

Sulphur Content: Max 40 MG/KG

 

6.FFA (free fatty acids): 2% Max

M&I (moisture and impurities): 1% Max

Iodine Value (IV): Min 80 G IOD/100G

Sulphur Content: Max 35 MG/KG