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US 11,884,568 B2Granted
Recycling of sodium sulfate in starch processing
AssigneeCorn Products Development, Inc.
InventorCarlos Eduardo Hurtado Gonzalez
Life of this patent
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Abstract
This specification discloses a system and method for treating process water from a starch process, and more specifically, recycling a concentrated sodium sulfate solution, obtained from the process water to the starch process.
Claims17
A system comprising:
- (a) a membrane bioreactor unit configured to treat process water, the process water comprising sodium sulfate, being from a starch process and having a chemical oxygen content at least 1000 mg(O2/L), the membrane bioreactor by being configured to reduce the chemical oxygen content of the process to less than 250 mg(O2)/L;
- (b) a cationic ion exchange unit configured to receive the permeate from the membrane bioreactor unit;
- and
- (c) a high pressure filtration unit configured to:
- i) receive the permeate from the cationic ion exchange unit, ii) concentrate sodium sulfate in the permeate from the cationic ion exchange unit to obtain a concentrated sodium sulfate solution having at least 100,000 mg/L sodium sulfate;
- and iii) recycle the concentrated sodium sulfate solution to the starch process
- wherein the high pressure filtration unit has a molecular weight cut off of less than 200 Da.
4 more elements
A method comprising:
- obtaining process water from a starch process;
- treating the process water in a membrane bioreactor unit;
- treating the permeate from the membrane bioreactor unit in a cationic ion exchange unit;
- concentrating the sodium sulfate in the permeate from the cationic ion exchange unit in a high pressure filtration unit to obtain a concentrated sodium sulfate solution having a sodium sulfate content of at least 100,000 mg/L;
- and
- recycling the concentrated sodium sulfate solution into the starch process
- wherein the high pressure filtration unit has a molecular weight cutoff less than 200 Da.
4 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.