1225	Dear sir, i am from sri lanka i have a idea to refine palm oil in sri lanka about 10 mton per day what is the best way to it and best machinery for import. Thanks	IRFAN
Dear Mr Irfan, As in most industries, the bigger the scale of production the lower the operating costs will be and 10 tonnes per day seems to me near the minimum possible quantity. On the questions you asked I can only help you privately for a fee. Please contact me on my private email address if you wish to go ahead. Regards, FP (14.09.2011)
1223	What is 1MT of CPO and PFAD equivalent in Litres? I have been asked by a shipping company who has never done Palm Oil shipment before and surprisingly I cannot answer him either. Thanks!	MY
Dear Mr MY, The quantity you want is called specific volume and shipping companies want to know it because their tanks are calibrated in litres while cargoes are sold in tonnes. For CPO it is 1.120 and for PFAD it is 1.155 litres/kg at 50C. Regards, FP (07.09.2011)
1222	Is the Palm oil & Palm stearin based Biodiesel will pass the COld Soak Filtration time (CSFT) test of ASTM. if not the distilled Biodiesel of the above will pass? Please reply. K SRAO anveshraovani@gmail.com	K. Srenivasa Rao
Dear Mr Rao, I do not think the straight biodiesel from PO or PSt will pass the ASTM cold test, but in the West this BD is normally blended with other grades to make it acceptable. If you distil it, the cold test on the whole product will not change, but you can select a fraction which will give better figures. The problem then will be what to do with the rest of it. Regards, FP (09.09.2011)
1221	What are affective that make price of palm oil go up or go down?	Yin Kwan
Dear Mr Kwan, In free markets the price of commodities is decided primarily by the law of supply and demand. As supply goes up, the price goes down so as to increase demand and take up the supply. In centrally controlled markets however, prices are controlled by government action. In my opinion, the former is more efficient and the latter is more just. Regards, FP (08.09.2011)
1219	Can i plant palm oil in 700 meters up of elevation?	william e. sy
Dear Mr Sy, Areas of high elevation tend to be drier, have lower temperature and more difficult access. But if those conditions are OK, I see no objection to elevation in it self. Any one who can grow oil palms should do so, because plantations never had it so good. Regards, FP (03.09.2011)
1218	Dear Frank, I have tried to write directly on the website but when I write the question, the button “ask a question” disappear. That is why I m trying to write you by the email address. I have a question regarding soap. We are a company that manufacture soap with white tallow, palm stearin and 20% PFAD and we add brown sugar to have a yellow brown soap. I noticied that when the finished soap is left at ambient temperature for a few hour, there is a change in the color. The soap tends to darken and have a more pronounced tan color a few hour later. I would like to know and understand what cause the soap to darken? Thank you, Ann Isabel Scott	Ann Isabel Lauture
Dear Ms Scott, I have never met this problem before. If it started with your new delivery of PS it could be that it is substandard. If you always had this problem it would be that one of the ingredients is reacting with the others in an unexpected way. All I can advise is to prepare a laboratory size batch leaving out the sugar and see what happens. Regards, FP (25.08.2011)
1217	Good afternoon, may i know the saturated fatty acid content in RBDPO, Olein IV56, Olein IV60 and stearin? Thank you.	Tiang Kon Tang
Dear Mr Tang, In PO, the main sat. fatty acids are palmitic (C16:0) at approx 44% and stearic (C18:0) 5%, a total of 49%. Palm olein IV 60 would contain approx. 45% total saturates and palm stearin about 65%. Naturally, there will be variations within samples, especially of stearin which is very variable. As you see palm olein is much more saturated than the other major oils. For example soy bean oil is only 16% sturated and so when people expect palm olein to be no more cloudy than SBO, they are asking for the impossible. Regards, FP (24.08.2011)
1216	May i ask in palm oil refinery, what is the main cause for the incomplete separation of Palm Fatty Acid Distillate and Moisture steam. Assume refinery is based on physical separation rather then chemical refining type plant.	LMY
Dear Mr LMY, Whenever oils and water are mixed they tend to form emulsions and the problems you have with them in a refinery are nothing compared with what they have in PO mills. PFAD is not pure fatty acid, it also contains small amounts of partial glycerides, short chain fatty acids, break down products etc, which are hydrophilic and act as emulsion stabilizers. Nature has designed most of its organic living matter to be miscible with water because with out it, there would be no life. Regards FP (24.08.2011)
1215	Let me know please, what is the specific loss of soya oil during neutralization by alkali Noah? Do u have any specific formula based on crude ffa%?	krishnakant
Dear Mr Krishnakant, There is no formula for predicting neutralisation losses because these depend on more factors than than simply the FFA. I have seen the odd formula in some books but they are all different and vaguely stated and my experience does not agree with them. Regards, FP (22.08.2011)
1214	Dear Frank, i have a problem in my vacuum system. When i run my vacuum system, i have a vacuum pressure of 2-3mbar but when i open the stripping steam (temperature: 95°C at 0.9bar), the vacuum pressure raise to 6-7mbar. please could you tell why the vacuum pressure is raising an how to solve it. thank for your advice.	Albert Alain Ngassa
Dear Mr Ngassa, If your deodoriser is producing good oil, I cannot not see why you bother with such engineering details. To answer your question I would have to know who made it, year of installation, hourly throughput, input and output FFA etc. But I really cannot get involved with the technicalities of running deodorising plants, I have not seen, from thousands of miles away. You must have paid $millions for your plant, the first people to ask are its designers. This page is for PO. Regards, FP (22.08.2011)
1213	Thanks FP for the answer 1211 question. I used high quality of ingridents that are RBD Palm stearine and palm kernel olein and the additives from BASF. But sir I heard RBD palm fatty acid distilled and palm fatty kernel distilled blend produce snow white noodles rather than RBD palm soft stearine and RBD kernel olein blend produce brown-grey white noodles, Is it true? Is it possible to produce snow white noodles by using the blend of 80: 20 of RBD palm stearine and RBD palm kernel olein?	Md. Shahinur Rahman Khan
Dear Mr Khan, I think you have misunderstood my reply 1211 a little. The oils you are now using are not very high quality soap materials and I told you they will only produce grayish soap. Distilled fatty acids are far better - and also more expensive- but there are differences between them too, so you better test different suppliers and grades before buying. But if you cannot get the appropriate specifications and do not want to go to the expense of having a works laboratory for testing new materials and deliveries, I cannot see how you can expect to produce soap of the highest colour standard. Regards, FP (22.08.2011)
1212	I would be highly obliged if someone could clear my doubts and add some information to the context. I am working as a professional in a renowned FMCG MNC in India. I would like to know if we write ‘Edible Vegetable oil’ or ‘Edible Vegetable Fat’ on the wrapper in ingredients than it means the same or it indicates which oil has been used in the recipe. Also what is the cloud point of palm oil and amongst palm and palmolein oil, which oil is better to use as far as properties are concerned. Would be waiting for a reply from your side.	Jasmin Kalra
Dear Ms Kalra, Food labelling regulations are made by the government of the country in which the food is sold and I am not familiar with those in India. Currently, in most countries, you can write vegetable fat or vegetable oil as the case may be, but in EU at least, there are now strong proposals for the name of the oil to be shown. I fully support these proposals because people have a right to know what they are eating. The cloud point of PO is not measured, it goes by melting point. As to which oil has the best properties, the number of properties is infinite, it depends on which ones you are interested in and what you are trying do. Regards, FP (23.08.2011)
1211	I am the plant in charge of a continuous saponification plant with toilet vacuum dryer, provided by Mazzoni LB SPA. I used 80: 20 ratio of RBD Palm Stearine and RBD palm kernel olein as my saponification reactor for toilet grade. In my toilet vacuum dryer I used HEDP, Tinapole CBS as mixing agent. But the toilet soap noodles is brown white as compare to fatty acid noodles that is ice white.however I need to increase the whiteness as ice white of toilet soap noodles. I could not change the oil quality because the only one supplier in bangladesh.How to increase the whiteness of toilet saop noodles?	Md. Shahinur Rahman Khan
Dear Mr Khan, You cannot use cheap ordinary ingredients and match the quality you get from expensive high quality materials. That is why people pay for them. I do not know what HEDP and Tinapole CBS are, but if they are not white, try to find white replacements. You have not told me the colour spec of your oils and if what you receive complies. Do not assume they do, you must test and verify. Your problem is probably the palm stearin which is known to give grey soap. There are oxidising agents and some whitening powders you can add which help but only the purest ingredients will give you snow white soap. Here I can only give you basic information on PO and other oils but I cannot go into the details of how to make downstream products. Regards, FP (21.08.2011)
1210	I would like to ask what the Metabolizable Energy of Palm Olein for swine? Tnx.	Stewart Tan
Dear Mr Tan, The figure I have is 7900 Kcal/Kg, so your value is safe. If the pigs are not growing you should not automatically blame the oil, but make sure it smells good and not rancid. High PV reduces its nutritive value. Regards, FP (21.08.2011)
1209	Re: 1175 Dear FP, Good day and thank you for your prompt answer. First, I would like to say sorry that I never mentioned that I am from which country, I'm from Japan. Our factory would like to use CPO for the biodiesel the but the supplier give us the grade,FFA is 5%, Moisture is 0.5% that the costing is too high that we can not cover. As what you say, the lower the FFA, the better the oil is for any purpose, including bio-diesel. What I need to do at this moment? Any suggestion? Your opinion is really helpful to us. Thank you and Best regards. MIKO. P/S : we are looking for the grade is not more that USD700.00.	Mr Fong
Dear Mr Fong, You will have to decide which CPO FFA is the highest you can use in your biodiesel process and if the price of that is too high, then you will have to find a different, cheaper, oil. Some biodiesel plants use animal fats or used oil from frying factories and restaurants, but how and where to get it in your area, is up to you. Your problem is commercial, not technical. Regards, FP (19.08.2011)
1208	Please tell me the difference between 'Edible Vegetable Oil' and 'Edible Vegetable Fat' if any of these is written on the wrapper under ingredients.	jk
Dear Ms jk, This is a very good question. From the chemical point of you, oils and fats are the same and the two terms are used interchangeably. By custom however, oils are liquid and fats are solid and so what is called fat in one country can be called oil in another. For example, PO is a fat in Europe, but an oil in the tropical countries of its origin. In some countries like Spain, Portugal etc. food regulations specify that the assessment whether it is liquid or solid should be done at 20C and this removes much of the ambiguity. There are still problems however, because there is the question of how liquid is liquid. Food retail companies like to call every thing oil, because of its better image. Regards, FP (19.08.2011)
1205	Hi sir, this is gangadhar from india, i want to know about mechanised oil palm cutter details, how it works, what is the cost of the machine in india, present here we are using the manual cutters which is difficult and the cost of labour is very high. so please send the details, where we find the machine in india, present the size of my farm is nearly 20 feet. so please provide me the details...	gangadhar
Dear Mr Gangadhar, I have no idea of machinery prices in India and I suggest you contact the manufacturers. The size of your farm cannot be 20 feet, that is a measurement of length, not of area. Regards, FP (21.08.2011)
1204	Dear Sir, I would like to know that "is soyoil has Fatty acid? and which oils of fatty acid is less cheaper than the others?	Eskinder Tesfaye
Dear Mr Tesfaye, Sorry I cannot understand your English. Perhaps you can get some one to help you and try again. In the mean time here is some information that may help you. All oils, including soy bean oil, are composed of compounds of fatty acids. About prices I cannot give you any information here, you must search the other pages of this website. The text at the top of this page is there to be read. Regards, FP (21.08.2011)
1203	Dear sir, i am an instrumentation engineer in process plant (fatty acid plant) my quire is that ,what is the process to finding the SFA (steric) from the base of PFAD. also guide me the range of temperature and distillation designee, thanks.	niket NIKI
Dear Mr Niki, I found it very difficult to understand your question because of the large number of mistakes in it and use of wrong words. But if I am guessing correctly, the method for determining the fatty acid composition of PFAD is called gas liquid chromatography (GLC). The saturated FA in it are about about 45% palmitic and 5% stearic (not steric). Their distillation temperature depends on the pressure and you can find it in engineering or chemical books. Regards, FP (21.08.2011)
1201	Kindly advice colour limit in crude plam oil ???	Rao
Dear Mr Rao, There is no colour specification for CPO because this oil is normally fully refined before use for food and so it is the colour of the refined oil that matters and not that of the crude. There is no correlation between the colours of the two grades, the FFA has a better correlation. Regards, FP (21.08.2011)