Method of and system for continuously processing liquid materials, and the product processed thereby

A system of continuously processing a liquid material with a supercritical or subcritical fluid, comprising:

• a) a material supply line for continuously supplying the liquid material:
• b) a carbon dioxide supply line for continuously supplying a liquefied carbon dioxide;
• c) a dissolving part where the liquefied carbon dioxide supplied through the carbon dioxide supply line is dissolved into the liquid material while the liquid material is continuously supplied through the material supply line;
• d) a critical processing part where the liquid material taken out from the dissolving part with the liquefied carbon dioxide dissolved therein is kept under a preset temperature-and-pressure condition so that the carbon dioxide is brought into a supercritical or subcritical state said critical processing part comprising a warming pipe and a heater;
• and
• e) a pressure reducing part where a pressure of the liquid material after passing the critical processing part is reduced rapidly for removing the carbon dioxide and the liquid material is collected as a product.

A system of continuously processing a liquid material with a supercritical or subcritical fluid comprising:

• a) a material supply line for continuously supplying the liquid material;
• b) a carbon dioxide supply line for continuously supplying a liquefied carbon dioxide;
• c) a dissolving part where the liquefied carbon dioxide supplied through the carbon dioxide supply line is dissolved into the liquid material while the liquid material is continuously supplied through the material supply line;
• d) a critical processing part where the liquid material taken out from the dissolving part with the liquefied carbon dioxide dissolved therein is kept under a preset temperature-and-pressure condition so that the carbon dioxide is brought into a supercritical or subcritical state;
• and
• e) a pressure reducing part where a pressure of the liquid material after passing the critical processing part is reduced rapidly for removing the carbon dioxide and the liquid material is collected as a product,
• where the dissolving part is constructed using a material supply pipe constituting the material supply line and the liquefied carbon dioxide from the carbon dioxide supply line is sent into the liquid material flowing in the material supply pipe.

A system of continuously processing a liquid material with a supercritical or subcritical fluid, comprising:

• a) a material supply line for continuously supplying the liquid material;
• b) a carbon dioxide supply line for continuously supplying a liquefied carbon dioxide;
• c) a dissolving part where the liquefied carbon dioxide supplied through the carbon dioxide supply line is dissolved into the liquid material while the liquid material is continuously supplied through the material supply line;
• d) a critical processing part where the liquid material taken out from the dissolving part with the liquefied carbon dioxide dissolved therein is kept under a preset temperature-and-pressure condition so that the carbon dioxide is brought into a supercritical or subcritical state;
• and
• e) a pressure reducing part where a pressure of the liquid material after passing the critical processing part is reduced rapidly for removing the carbon dioxide and the liquid material is collected as a product where the critical processing part includes:
• a plurality of processing units operable independent of each other;
• and
• a line configuration mechanism for configuring a line or lines in the critical processing part so that the liquid material from the dissolving part is transferred to a part or all of the processing units selected from the plurality of the processing units according to a necessity.

A system of continuously processing a liquid material with a supercritical or subcritical fluid comprising:

• a) a material supply line for continuously supplying the liquid material;
• b) a carbon dioxide supply line for continuously supplying a liquefied carbon dioxide)
• c) a dissolving part where the liquefied carbon dioxide supplied through the carbon dioxide supply line is dissolved into the liquid material while the liquid material is continuously supplied through the material supply line;
• d) a critical processing part where the liquid material taken out from the dissolving part with the liquefied carbon dioxide dissolved therein is kept under a preset temperature-and-pressure condition so that the carbon dioxide is brought into a supercritical or subcritical state;
• and
• e) a pressure reducing part where a pressure of the liquid material after passing the critical processing part is reduced rapidly for removing the carbon dioxide and the liquid material is collected as a product, where the dissolving part includes:
• a plurality of dissolving units operable independent of each other;
• and
• a line configuration mechanism for configuring a line or lines in the dissolving part so that the liquid material from the material supply line is transferred to a part or all of the dissolving units selected from the plurality of the dissolving units according to a necessity.

A method of continuously processing a liquid material with a supercritical or subcritical fluid, comprising:

• a) a dissolving stage where a liquefied carbon dioxide is continuously supplied into the liquid material while the liquid material is continuously supplied to dissolve the liquefied carbon dioxide into the liquid material;
• b) a critical processing stage where the liquid material with the liquefied carbon dioxide dissolved therein is kept under a preset temperature-and-pressure condition so that the carbon dioxide is brought into a supercritical or subcritical state;
• and
• c) a pressure-reducing stage where the pressure of the liquid material alter passing the critical processing step is reduced to remove the carbon dioxide and the liquid material is retrieved as a product,
• where the dissolving stage includes a step of dissolving the liquefied carbon dioxide into the liquid material by sending the liquefied carbon dioxide into the liquid material flowing in a material supply pipe.

A system of continuously processing a liquid material with a supercritical or subcritical fluid, comprising:

• a) a material supply line for continuously supplying the liquid material,
• b) a carbon dioxide supply line for continuously supplying a liquefied carbon dioxide;
• c) a dissolving part where the liquefied carbon dioxide supplied through the carbon dioxide supply line-is dissolved into the liquid material while the liquid material is continuously supplied through the material supply line;
• d) a critical processing part where the liquid material taken out from the dissolving part with the liquefied carbon dioxide dissolved therein is kept under a preset temperature-and-pressure condition so that the carbon dioxide is brought into a supercritical or subcritical state;
• and
• e) a pressure reducing part where a pressure of the liquid material after passing the critical processing part is reduced rapidly for removing the carbon dioxide and the liquid material is collected as a product.
• where the dissolving part includes a dissolving chamber, an inlet for the liquid material from the liquid material supply line and another inlet for the liquefied carbon dioxide from the carbon dioxide supply line are provided at the bottom of the chamber and a take-out port is provided in an upper part of the chamber at about a level of the liquid material.