Economic Conversion of Date Pits into Oils for Cosmetics

Project number: 
22081
Sponsor: 
UA Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering
Academic year: 
2021-2022
The date pit is an economic waste product generated as a byproduct of date fruit production. These seeds contain antioxidants such as carotenoids, polyphenols and tannins, along with unsaturated fatty acids such as oleic and linoleic acids, that keep hair, skin and nails healthy.

The team developed a process to extract about 95% of the available seed oil using supercritical carbon dioxide (SC-CO2). Gaseous carbon dioxide is heated and compressed to supercritical conditions, then pumped to an extracting vessel containing ground date pits. The SC-CO2 extracts the oil from the pits and is then separated from the oil with a pressure reduction valve. A flash drum pressure drop removes the remaining carbon dioxide from the oil. The carbon dioxide is recycled back into the process after separation. The resulting date seed oil is more than 95% pure due to the efficiency of the separation process.

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