Demonstration of NIR inline monitoring

Demonstration of NIR inline monitoring

Demonstration of NIR inline monitoring for hops extraction and micronization of
benzoic acid in supercritical CO₂

D. Böhm, T. Grau, N. Igl-Schmid, S. Johnsen, E. Kaczowka, A. Klotz, J. Schulmeyr, M. Türk, G. Wiegand, A. Wuzik, B. Zehnder

The use of supercritical CO₂ as solvent for separation processes and chemical reactions is widespread. Many industrial extraction processes using CO₂ consume a huge amount of energy and hence are very cost-intensive. In the past, the duration of extraction was often longer than required for an optimum result. Therefore, an inline monitoring device for terminating CO₂ extraction processes at the right time has been desirable. In collaboration between KIT and SITEC-Sieber Engineering, Switzerland, amobile near infrared (NIR) inline monitoring device has been developed to close this gap and to offer an opportunity to implement it into industrial extractions processes using CO₂ and to use the data for process optimization. NIR spectroscopy with fiber optics adaption has been proven to be a very good choice, because the CO₂ bands are well separated from all other bands of interest caused by the extracts (organics and water).

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