Extraction and separation of oils: the journey from distillation to pervaporation

Extractible oils from natural sources have found their use in diverse industrial sectors such as food, value-added products/cosmetics, and pharmaceuticals. Challenges faced in the conventional methods of separating oils from water demand new approaches, not only for adapting economical procedures but also to address environmental issues relating to oily wastewater. Oil-water separation (i.e. demulsification) has captured the interest of researchers to overcome this oily wastewater crisis. Technologies involving membranes for the separation process stands promising to provide cutting-edge solutions in remediation. Pervaporation is one of the most capable among different membrane separation techniques and is exploited to separate azeotropic mixtures and organic–organic mixtures. Apart from membrane demulsification and other physical processes, this chapter summarizes and provides an overview of chemical and biological techniques, thus reciting the evolution in the technologies developed for oil-water separation. Subsequently, a reader is exposed to the most recent advancements in this domain and cutting-edge perspectives of providing solutions associated with the disadvantages of the respective technologies.