The Continuous Process of QUAKER OATS

In the nineteen sixties, after having used their original batch process for some 40 years, QUAKER OATS built a revolutionary continuously operating furfural plant in Belle Glade, Florida. Although this plant ceased operation in 1997, it was a milestone in furfural technology. 

Through multiple nozzles, steam and sulfuric acid were added. The steam had a pressure of 160 psi = 10.888 ATM, but it was superheated to 650 C. This had a drying effect, so that in spite of the water added with the acid, the residue left the reactor with a moisture content in the order of 40 percent. 

At a total residence time of one hour, the furfural yield of this process was 55 percent. Attempts to run the plant without sulfuric acid had to be abandoned as due to insufficient softening of the bagasse the reactors jammed. 

There were only minor operational problems with this continuous process, and all of these problems would have been amenable to elimination by improved control equipment (a) If the bagasse feed was interrupted, the pressure seal would be lost, so that a blow-back would result in an emptying of the reactors. 

As to the reasons for shutting down the plant, they were manifold, and not exclusively of a technical nature  

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