Pre-feasibility assessment to obtain an extract rich in hesperidin from orange peel: A comparison of extraction technologies conventional and non-conventional

The orange peel contains two polyphenolic compound groups: hydroxycinnamic acid and flavonoids, where the most prevalent are flavanones, such as hesperidin, which has many therapeutic properties. This work compared the solid:liquid, and supercritical fluid extraction to obtain hesperidin using orange peel as raw material and ethanol as solvent. Additionally, the technical and economic assessment of the extraction processes is performed using the experimental results. The solid:liquid extraction provides its maximum yield with an ethanol concentration of 70 %; however, an ethanol concentration of 50 % provides the maximum content of polyphenols (5620.59 mg Gallic Acid Equivalents/100 g biomass) and hesperidin (1512.10 mg/100 g biomass). While the use of supercritical fluids showed a maximum hesperidin concentration of 153.32 mg/100 g biomass, a maximum yield of 6.24 %, and a total polyphenol content of 822.93 mg Gallic Acid Equivalents/100 g biomass. An economic analysis showed that the low yield of supercritical fluid extraction leads to economically unfeasible processes. Although the solid: liquid extraction using ethanol at 50 % v/v provides the best results in the economic assessment with a profit margin of 45.16 % and a positive net present value at 10 years of 970,649.29 USD.