Hey guys, needing some assistance on how to properly recover ethanol out of spent biomass, we are using a 6 inch Vincent screw to press with and it does not seem to be fully dewatering the ethanol out of the biomass, the spent material once dried test non detectable as far as cannabinoids are concerned so we know we are doing a good job of removing 99% of the available oils. But we still are seeing around a 20% ethanol loss. Looking at options or for options rather on how to heat up large batches of spent biomass under vaccum to evaporate off the remaining ETH. Has anyone done something similiar?
Panda spinner
Cup
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What mass of plant material are you talking about per run?
If you’re running just a few pounds then Demontrich is right, Panda spinner is the way to go.
I may try that as a small test batch but we are running 500lbs to 750 lbs batches when pressing, so not really feasible on a large scale unless there is a large prefab model that works about the same.
What equipment are you using for extraction?
Does that ~600 lb represent multiple extraction runs combined or is that per run?
What you are looking for is a large scale or high throughput solvent removal strategy.
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That represents one run. We are adding 500-750 pounds of biomass to a mixing tank. Soaking that with ethanol at a 2-1 ethanol to biomass weight ratio. It then gets pressed through a screw. The solution is then put into a large walk in at -30 degrees F for 2 days and then we run it through a watermark filter press. Post filtering we are using a bizzy bee FF for recovery and then a few 50L rotovaps to finish it.
Although the biomass is generally pressed twice unless it is naturally dried because that seems to press much easier. The second pass is a 1 to 1 biomass to ethanol weight ratio
This seems like a good setup. In my experience a press leaves a lot more ethanol behind than a centrifugal system.
Are you looking to recover the ethanol to reuse it or simply remove it from the plant material in order to make disposal easier and less flammable?
Both, we want it to be as removed as possible. To first off be compliant with state VOC laws and secondly to conserve waste that can be reused.
A delta or cup may work.
@cyclopath
Just look at his avatar and see what he standing in for reference.
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How are you running your press? I feel like you just need to up the pressure or adjust the motor speed. The screw press will deff work unless there is some critical flaw in it. @VincentCorp1931 care to help this guy out?
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Have you thought of using a decanter centrifuge to remove ethanol from your biomass? With our centrifuges we can get your biomass dry with less than 1% ethanol. Let me know if you would like additional information.
We are running it over the specifications that Rob from Vincent gave to us, the product specs say 80-100 psi and we are right around 125 for the majority of the run. We have felt the same but it is very difficult to get in contact with these guys. You would think for a press of that cost they would have a half way decent customer service team.
what is the biggest batch sizes we could run in it? Either way I would appreciate some further info. tylerrupprecht@gmail.com. thank you
Ill send some information over now.
Thanks
The critter I’m sitting in should get fairly close to the throughput of thAt press…when I figure out how to feed & unload it appropriately.
If @ZwerkProcessing is really doing 2lb ethanol to 1lb biomass, their solvent use is pretty close to what I can do in a fuge.
I could be wrong (again 
), but I’ve never run into an ethanol extractor that measured their ratio that way and suspect they’re using a total of 3gal per lb of biomass rather than getting 3lb of biomass per gal of ethanol like I am.
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Where are you playing this game?
If you get a decanter I’ll give you a 50% discount on my daily rate to come help you integrate it into your work flow.
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We are located in the thumb of Michigan. That is just the ethanol mixture we have found to work best for our setup, not claiming to be “right” obviously that is why I am reaching for the community for some guidance haha. But we would be more than happy to have you and would love to check out what services you have to offer! Thanks for the response!
we would also be very interested in how your spent material tests. There is no one locally anyways with a centrifuge that can come close to 2% oil content left in the aoent material when we are far below sub 1%, infact normally they are N/D levels which is what the customer likes to see.