Grant: Applied Research and Development Grants - Level 1

Currently, many natural oil industries use flammable chemicals, high pressure procedures and extremetemperatures for the extraction of botanical oils from biomass, whether it be from flowers, stalks, roots, orleaves. This processes requires extremely specialized equipment and high facility safety standards which isvery costly for industry manufacturers. In addition, these ethanol-based methods require removal of the ethanol from the desired oil product which is done through evaporation and distillation and requires high energy usage processes, resulting in a high carbon footprint for the extraction and post-processing. Maratek Environmental Inc., located in Bolton, ON, manufactures environmentally conscious products thatrecycle waste for re-use from a number of different materials. Maratek Environmental is looking to is to create a water-based extraction procedure for recovery of botanical oils from biomass.Maratek Environmental has previously reviewed the potential dangers and low energy efficiency of existingextraction methods regarding botanical oils. By developing a water-based extraction method, MaratekEnvironmental will be positioned as a Canadian private sector company with a technology to revolutionize and improve the extraction industry and reduce hazardous chemical usage significantly.In response to this, Maratek Environmental, in collaboration with the Lambton College Research andInnovation Office, will focus on developing and optimizing an extraction method for botanical oils using water as the extraction medium. The success of this project will allow Maratek Environmental to create a product linethat improves safety, matches extraction efficiency of established methods, and decreases post-processing time by eliminating the need for expensive and time-consuming distillation processes.