Compressed fluids for food by-product biorefinery

Abstract

Food industries produce annually billions of tons of wastes that have become a major concern worldwide. These residues can be valorized by different strategies leading to a sustainable utilization of feedstock. Thus, the biorefinery concept is a promising option to reduce environmental impact with an obvious economic advantage. Furthermore, the use of greener solvents in combination with compressed fluid technologies for biorefinery approaches has several favourable features involving less time, an enhancement of the extraction efficiencies and a reduction in the energy employed. The present chapter highlights the potential of biorefinery approaches based on compressed fluid technologies and gives an overview of their applications to obtain high added-value products from food residues. Combinations of compressed fluid technologies are reviewed always taking into account a green chemistry point of view.