Supercritical extraction from solid: process design data (2001–2003)

Supercritical extraction from solid substrate using carbon dioxide as solvent, with or without the addition of cosolvent, has proved to be technically feasible. The relatively high investment costs associated with high pressure processes are responsible for the elimination of this technology at the very early stages of the process design, that is, during the selection of an extraction process. In order to avoid this, a preliminary analysis of the manufacturing costs must be done with a minimum of experimental information. In this review a compilation of the process parameters required for the economic analysis is presented.