Short answer: a palm oil extraction line for 8 tons of fresh fruit per day lets a small or medium plantation process its own harvest instead of selling it to a large mill. It includes sterilization, threshing, digestion, pressing, clarification and oil drying, and its boiler runs on the process's own residues. The Meelko line costs USD 62,315. Below: what each stage does, who it suits and how much oil to expect.
Who an 8-ton-per-day plant is for
That capacity matches the daily output of about 50 hectares of mature oil palm. It is the scale of a mid-sized grower, an association of smallholders or a cooperative that sells fruit bunches today and wants to keep the oil margin. In palm-growing regions of Latin America, Africa or Southeast Asia, where the nearest mill may be far away or pay little, processing at source changes the business.
There is also a technical reason: palm fruit starts losing quality as soon as it is harvested, because its own enzymes raise the oil's acidity. The sooner it is processed, the better the oil. A plant of your own, close to the crop, shortens that time.
The six stages of the line
- Sterilization: bunches go into horizontal steam autoclaves. Steam stops the enzymes that raise acidity and softens the pulp for the next stages.
- Threshing: a rotating drum separates the fruit from the stalks. Empty bunches are used as compost or fuel.
- Digestion: the fruit is heated and macerated with paddles in a steam-jacketed cylinder to release the oil from the pulp.
- Pressing: a continuous screw press separates crude oil from the cake of fiber and nuts.
- Clarification: crude oil comes out mixed with water and solids. It is settled in tanks, and oil is recovered from the sludge with centrifuges.
- Drying: a vacuum dryer removes residual moisture so the oil keeps in storage and transport.
The boiler that supplies steam to the whole line burns pressing fiber and nut shells: the plant supplies its own thermal energy from its own waste. Parts in contact with oil are stainless steel.
How much oil you get
Extraction rate depends on variety, bunch ripeness and the time between harvest and processing. As a general reference, crude palm oil is around 20% of the weight of fresh fruit bunches. On that assumption, 8 tons of fruit a day yield about 1.6 tons of crude oil per day. You also get the nuts, from which palm kernel is obtained, and fiber and empty bunches that feed the boiler or go back to the field as compost.
To work out the return, multiply tons of crude oil by the local price, subtract what you are paid for the fruit today and operating costs, and compare with the investment.
Complete line or press only
If you already have sterilization and threshing, or process small volumes, there is a palm oil press for 300 to 500 kg/h (15 kW, USD 5,983), which processes sterilized and threshed fruit with over 90% extraction efficiency according to its product page. The complete 8 t/day line covers the whole plant in one project. Its modular design allows installation in stages.
If you also process other oilseeds such as soybean, sunflower or peanut, screw presses for seeds are covered in how to set up a small oil and expeller plant.
Before you invest
- Secure the fruit. The plant pays off if it runs every day: you need your own hectares or agreements with neighboring growers.
- Water and steam. Sterilization and clarification use water and steam; plan the supply and effluent treatment.
- Permits. A mill needs environmental approval and, if it sells food-grade oil, health approval.
- A buyer for the crude oil. Refineries, food or soap manufacturers, or exporters: have the destination defined before producing.
Conclusion
An 8-ton-per-day line turns the harvest of about 50 hectares into crude oil, with its own energy and usable by-products. Meelko, an American brand of agro-industrial machinery, offers the complete palm oil extraction line and oil presses for palm and seeds. Tell us how many hectares you have or how many tons of bunches you can process per day, and we will propose the plant.
