Computer-aided economic evaluation of pectin extraction from cocoa pod husk (Theobroma cacao L.)

摘要

Pectin is a complex mixture of polysaccharides widely applied in food, cosmetic and pharmaceutical industry. The increasing demand of pectin has caused the search of raw materials for extracting process such as cocoa husks, sisal waste, peach pomace, banana peel and Citrullus lanatus fruit rinds. In this research, economic feasibility was applied for industrial implementation of pectin extraction process from cocoa pod husk (Theobroma cacao L.) by hydrolysis with citric acid using commercial software Aspen Plus v8.0. Aspen Process Economic Evaluator was used to perform economic evaluation, obtaining as results an Internal Rate of Return (IRR) of 33% and Payback Period (PP) of 4 years, which indicates that the proposed process is profitable.