Concentration of natural aroma compounds from fruit juice hydrolates by pervaporation in laboratory and semi-technical scale. Part 2. Economic analysis

Abstract

The second part of a two-article series presents an economic analysis of the production of concentrated apple juice hydrolates via pervaporation. The average permeability of the membrane and the results obtained for the semi-pilot scale studies presented in the first part of the paper allowed for the determination of the required membrane area for the separation of aroma compounds from apple hydrolate. The simulation was divided into the base case scenario and sensitivity analysis for both batch and continuous process configurations. The economic indicators made it possible to calculate the cost-effectiveness of the implementation of the proposed solution. Both the base case scenarios and their sensitivity analysis revealed that the continuous production generates significantly higher revenues over the batch case. The results of the economic analysis demonstrated that pervaporation is a profitable and feasible option for aroma recovery from fruit hydrolates.