Ultrasonic acoustic-cavitation as a novel and emerging energy efficient technique for oil extraction from kapok seeds

摘要

Ultrasound is one of the emerging and novel techniques in oil extraction process. In this study, the oil was extracted from kapok seed using ultrasonic acoustic cavitation and conventional extraction techniques. The present study results found that Ultrasonic Cavitation-Assisted Extraction (UCAE) produced 92.29% of oil recovery with a shorter extraction time of 10 min compared to solvent extraction (5.7 h) and Soxhlet (8 h). The fatty acid composition of oils revealed that the linoleic acid (33.86%-37.64%), palmitic acid (21.79%-25.42%), and oleic acid (23.39%-25.01%) are predominantly present in oils. The oil obtained from UCAE, contains slightly higher composition of oleic, linoleic, malvalic and sterculic acids compared to other methods. The total energy consumption taking into account all possible utilisation was measured and found that the energy consumption of CUAE method is 80 folds lower than soxhlet and 50 folds lesser than SE.