Energy Reports 6 (2020) 3080–3087

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A solar steam distillation system for extracting lavender volatile oil

∗
Mona N. Radwan, M.M. Morad, M.M. Ali, Kamal I. Wasfy
Agricultural Engineering Department, Faculty of Agriculture, Zagazig University, Egypt

article info a b s t r a c t

Article history: A solar steam distillation system is constructed to be used for extracting volatile oils distinguished
Received 3 July 2020 of simple design and high efficiency. The solar distillation system consists of a parabolic solar dish
Received in revised form 4 October 2020 collector, boiler, extracting unit, condenser and connection hoses. The performance of the constructed
Accepted 7 November 2020
solar distillation system is studied as a function of change in boiler inlet water flow rate (1.00, 1.25 and
Available online 12 November 2020
1.50 l/h) and a batch size of the whole lavender plant (400, 600 and 800 g). Performance evaluation
Keywords: is conducted in terms of system efficiency, productivity, extraction efficiency, essential oil yield and
Parabolic solar collector final product quality.
Distillation unit Results reveal that the solar steam distillation system has been proven to be an effective way for
Lavender plant extracting high-quality lavender volatile oil with 7.3 ml system productivity, 60.25 % system efficiency,
Water flow rate
98.13% extraction efficiency and 0.785% (w/w) essential oil yield under conditions of 1.25 l/h boiler
Essential oil yield
inlet water flow rate and 800 g batch size.
Product quality
The solar system requires approximately two, three and four hours for extracting oil from batch
sizes of 400, 600 and 800 g, respectively.
© 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

1. Introduction from lavender had a strong contribution to the international mar-

Solar energy is a kind of renewable energy used in many
agricultural aspects. Solar energy serves in the agriculture field by
saving money and reduces environmental pollution. Solar energy
can help and facilitate extracting volatile oils from medicinal and
aromatic plants.
Medicinal and aromatic plants and their extracts are consid-
ered of great importance as export products for most of the
developing countries. According to WHO (World Health Organi-
zation), around 21,000 plant species have the potential for using
as medicinal plants added to that 80 percent of people worldwide
depend on herbal medicines for their health care needs. Essential
oils are a kind of the subtle aromatic and volatile liquids extracted
from any part of plants through distillation. They are used in the
food industry as a flavoring in the cosmetic industry for fragrance
and in the pharmaceutical industry for its functional properties.
The steam distillation process aims to break the glands of oil in
the plants, vaporize the oil and then, condensed and separated
from the water. The lavender essential oil has important usage in
the industry like soaps, perfumes, colognes, skin lotions and other
cosmetics, added to food manufacturing like flavoring beverages,
ice cream and baked goods (Kim and Lee, 2002). Essential oils
∗ Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: mona.nasr19@yahoo.com (M.N. Radwan),
drmorad555@yahoo.com (M.M. Morad), msj148@yahoo.com (M.M. Ali),
kamal.moursy@gmail.com (K.I. Wasfy).
ket, mainly as additives in the production of food and perfume
products (Rezzoug et al., 2005). Steam distillation is the most
widely accepted method on a commercial scale for producing
essential oils; about 90% of the essential oils are produced by this
method (Öztekin and Martinov, 2007).
Referring to solar energy applications in extracting volatile
oils from medicinal and aromatic plants, a decentralized solar
distillation system was developed for extracting essential oils
from herbs using a fixed focus Scheffler concentrator. Within the
beam radiation in the range of 700–800 W/m2 , the recorded focus
receiver temperatures were 300–400 ◦ C. The power and system
efficiency values were 1.55 kW and 33.21%, respectively at 739
W/m2 solar radiation (Munir and Hensel, 2010). The developed
solar distillery was utilized for distilling essential oils from medic-
inal and aromatic plants. According to experiments, essential
oils of 28.2 ml were obtained by 3.18 kW h thermal energy for
9.1 kg peppermint leaves, while obtained 1.425 ml essential oil
by 3.87 kW h thermal energy for 11.6 kg Melissa leaves (Munir
et al., 2014). The distillation system was developed to produce
essential oils by water–steam distillation from medicinal and
aromatic plants. This water–steam distillation system consisted
of solar compound parabolic collectors (CPCs) and distillation
units. The distillation unit was accommodated to distill 5 kg
plant each batch. The gain heat by solar CPCs was transferred
to the distillation unit. The overall thermal efficiency of solar
CPCs differed from 27.9% to 34.3% (Kültüre and Tarhan, 2016).
A system for extracting the essential oils from herbs by a steam

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.egyr.2020.11.034
2352-4847/© 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
M.N. Radwan, M.M. Morad, M.M. Ali et al.
Table 1
Some properties of lavender plant.
Properties Values
Stem diameter (mm) 3.26
Stem length (cm) 25–45
Plant mass (g) 8–32
Number of branches 6–26
Number of leaves 11–50
receiver in combination with a hybrid biomass-based boiler was
developed. Results indicate that essential oils concentration was
0.59% w/w from fresh eucalyptus leaves and 0.40% w/w for pep-
permint leaves (Afzal et al., 2017). Solar energy was used in
extracting essential oil. The extraction rate and yield percent
were determined at normal conditions. Results showed that the
extraction rate varied with the plant samples of oregano as the
fastest (3.4 ml/day) and rose petals as the slowest (1.8 ml/day).
The yield percent of plant extracts varied with the kind of plant
samples, sambong (Conyza balsamifera Linn) having 72% as the
highest percent yield and 18.5% for rose petals (Rosa damascena)
as the lowest percent yield (Pesimo, 2017).
From the above previous literature review, it is clear that dif-
ferent researches were conducted and published on solar systems
that were used for extracting volatile oils from the leaves of
medicinal and aromatic plants and the most important emerging
problems during the extraction process. However, such studies
have to be carried out to find out a simple solar system from local
material to be used easily for the extraction process with a high
extraction efficiency of whole lavender plants.
Therefore, the main purpose of the present investigation was
to construct a solar steam distillation system for extracting
volatile oil from the lavender plant. To achieve the ultimate goal,
the following criteria were taken into consideration:
• Study some different operating parameters affecting the
performance of the solar steam distillation system.
• Compare the final lavender oil quality obtained by the con-
structed solar steam distillation system with the standards
of quality guidelines.
2. Materials and methods
A solar steam distillation system for extracting volatile oil was
constructed specially for this work from low cost, local material
and tested in Belbeis city (30◦ 25′ 17.9′′ N. 31◦ 30′ 32.6′′ E), Sharqia
Governorate, Egypt. The experiments were carried out during the
summer season of 2019.
2.1. Experimental setup
2.1.1. The used plant
The used plant for extracting its volatile oil was lavender (La-
vandula angustifolia). Some properties of the experimental plant
were illustrated in Table 1.
2.1.2. The solar steam distillation system
A solar steam distillation system suitable for extracting volatile
oil from lavender consisted of the following main parts: parabolic
solar dish collector, boiler, extracting unit, condenser and connec-
tion hoses as indicated in Figs. 1 and 2.
■ Parabolic solar dish collector
Parabolic solar concentrated dish collector as a point-focus
collector was installed to gain heat from solar radiation and
tracked the sun in two axes for heating the water. It was made
of aluminum with a 1.7 m dish aperture diameter and 2.5 m2
surface area. Additionally, the surface was covered and assembled
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Energy Reports 6 (2020) 3080–3087
carefully with aluminum foil to get a precise focal point. A manual
tracking mechanism was provided and adjusted to follow the
sun so that the incident beam radiation will be reflected and
concentrated in the focus area. Two motions about the horizontal
and vertical axis were necessary to fix both solar azimuth and
solar altitude angles. So, two-axis truckers (full tracking) moved
east to west and north to south to collect normal solar radiation
throughout the year.
■ Boiler
The used boiler was made of stainless steel with a 2 mm
thickness. It was 20 cm in diameter, 30 cm height and has a
volume of 9.42 l. The boiler size was suitable to admit most
of the concentrated sunlight with a limitation for radiation and
convection losses. It was put at the concentrator focus. The boiler
had two openings in its top. The first opening was used to feed
cool water through a pipe (1.26 cm diameter) to keep continuous
water flow, while the other opening was to deliver steam to
the extracting unit through another pipe (2.64 cm diameter)
connected with stainless steel hose of 2.94 cm diameter. The
boiler was fully insulated with fiberglass to reduce the heat losses,
expect the exposed part to the solar rays, which was reflected by
the dish surface. The water supplied to the boiler was adjusted
to be with various continuous flow rates through a water tank
located at 2.5 m from the system base.
■ Extracting unit
The extracting unit was manufactured to accommodate
enough batch sizes of the lavender plant and it was completely
insulated with fiberglass to reduce heat losses. The extracting
unit was cylindrical in shape with a 30 cm diameter and 50 cm
height. The extracting unit was made of stainless steel with a
2 mm thickness. A net with a 29 cm diameter was installed inside
the extracting unit at a height of 7 cm from the bottom of the
unit (based on preliminary experiments) to put the lavender plant
batch to allow the steam to extract volatile oil easily. The unit had
two openings; the first opening was located in the unit bottom
to deliver steam produced from the boiler to the extracting unit
to move around and inside the plant to extract volatile oil. While
the second opening was located in the unit top to deliver steam
with the extracted volatile oil to the condenser to extract oil.
■ Condenser
The used condenser was a counter flow heat exchanger. The
condenser used a system of tubes exposed to constant water flow
to cool and facilitate the condensation. It was made from glass
and consisted of outer and inner tubes. The outer tube was 35 cm
length and 2.58 cm in diameter. While the inner tube was the
shape of six bulges of 1 cm in diameter with five throats of 0.5 cm
in diameter. The condenser consisted of four openings for steam
inlet, condensed water outlet, cooling water inlet and cooling
water outlet. The condenser unit was connected with a water
tank to receive the cooling water and controlled by a hand valve.
And also, it was associated with the extracting unit to receive
steam and oil to be cooled to produce volatile oil. The extracted
volatile oil was collected in a funnel tube. The oil was less dense
than water so it floated up and then collected.
■ Connection hoses
The connection hoses were made of rubber tubes to prevent
any heat loss through the steam flow. Additionally, they were
connected with hand valves to control any part and water flow
rates.
2.2. Methods
Experiments were done to assess the performance of the con-
structed solar steam distillation system for extracting volatile oil
from the lavender plant.
M.N. Radwan, M.M. Morad, M.M. Ali et al. Energy Reports 6 (2020) 3080–3087

Fig. 1. View of the constructed solar steam distillation system.

Fig. 2. The solar steam distillation system.

2.2.1. Experimental conditions
The performance of the solar steam distillation system was
studied under the following parameters:
• Three different boiler inlet water flow rates (1.00, 1.25 and
1.50 l/h).
• Three different batch sizes of the whole plant (400, 600 and
800 g).
The extracting time was kept constant at four hours during the
day from 11:00 to 15:00. The whole lavender plant was placed
on trays in the extracting unit with a constant moisture content
of 50.7% (wb) under all experimental conditions.
Each flow rate or batch volume was adjusted prior to the
start of the experiment and then maintained while studying their
effect on the volatile oil extraction process.
2.2.2. Measurements and determinations
The performance of the solar steam distillation system was
evaluated taking into consideration the following indicators:
• Thermal performance of the solar steam distillation system
The thermal performance of the solar steam distillation sys-
tem was illustrated through recording system temperatures and
system efficiency as:
■ System temperatures
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Solar radiation and temperatures versus time of the day were
recorded throughout the experiments. Dish focus temperature
(Tfocus ) as well as both extracting unit inlet (to the extracting
unit) and outlet (from the extracting unit) steam temperatures
(TEi and TEo ) added to boiler outlet steam temperature (TBo ) were
measured. Temperatures were recorded by copper-constantan
thermocouples, T type.
■ System efficiency
Solar extraction system efficiency (ηs , %) was estimated using
the following formula according to Munir and Hensel (2009) as:
ηs = [P /(As × Gb )] × 100 (1)
where: P: Power required for operating the solar extraction sys-
tem (W), As: Aperture area of the reflector (2.46 m2 in average)
and Gb : Beam radiation (W/m2 ).
The required power (P) for operating the solar extraction
system was calculated as:
P = (Qs + QL )/t (2)
Qs = mw Cp ∆T (3)
where: Qs : Sensible heat (kJ), mw : Water mass (kg), Cp : The
specific heat (Cp = 4.187 kJ/kg for water) and ∆T: Temperature
difference at a specific time (◦ K).
QL = mLfg (4)
M.N. Radwan, M.M. Morad, M.M. Ali et al.
where: QL : Latent heat (kJ), m: Evaporated water quantity in
a specific period of time (kg) and Lfg : Specific latent heat of
vaporization (for water = 2260 kJ/kg).
• Operational performance of the solar steam distillation system
The operational performance of the solar steam distillation
system was conducted through recording system productivity,
extraction efficiency and essential oil yield as:
■ System productivity
The hourly solar extraction system productivity (SP, ml/h) was
calculated using the following equation:
SP = V /t (5)
where: V : Volume of extracted volatile oil (ml) and t: Operating
time for extracting oil (h).
The cumulative solar extraction system productivity (ml) was
estimated by the end of the extraction period (four hours) under
all experimental conditions.
■ Extraction Efficiency
The efficiency of extracting oil was estimated according to
that 100 g lavender contains 1.00 ml volatile oil (Munir and
Hensel, 2009). Extraction efficiency (ηEx ) was calculated using the
following formula by Munir and Hensel (2009) as:
ηEX = (moil /maxoil ) × 100 (6)
where: moil : Mass of extracted oil (g) and maxoil : Maximum mass
of oil per plant batch (g).
■ Essential oil yield
Essential oil yield was estimated using the following formula
according to Munir et al. (2014) as:
Essential oil yield = (moil /mplant ) × 100 (7)
where: mplant : Mass of plant per batch (g).
• Final lavender oil quality
Final lavender oil quality was assessed by some oil chemical
properties. Random samples of lavender oil were taken under the
experimental recommended conditions to obtain oil quality. Final
product quality was determined in percentages of Linalool, Linalyl
acetate, Camphor, Terpineol-4-ol and Cymene.
3. Results and discussion
The obtained results of the two conducted test scenarios [the
first test scenario of boiler inlet water flow rate (1.00, 1.25 and
1.50 l/h) and the second test scenario of a batch size of the whole
lavender plant (400, 600 and 800 g)] will be discussed as follow:
3.1. Climatic conditions
Fig. 3 showed variation in the climatic conditions versus time
of day during experimentation. Solar radiation was recorded as
global and beam radiation in order to estimate the system effi-
ciency. The recorded data were conducted on dated 27 September
2019 from 9.0 am to 18.0 pm. The solar radiation increased gradu-
ally from morning hours and reached its highest value at 13.0 pm.
and then decreased. The global solar radiation varied from 110.95
to 892.75 W/m2 , while the beam radiation ranged from 90.31
to 755.83 W/m2 . The ambient temperature varied from 23.85 to
35.82 ◦ C. The highest value of ambient temperature was obtained
at 12.0 pm. The recorded data for the other experimental days of
2019 took the same behavior.
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Fig. 3. The climatic conditions of the experimental region (dated on 27
September 2019).
3.2. Thermal performance of the solar steam distillation system
The thermal performance of the solar steam distillation system
was measured by recording both system temperatures as well as
system efficiency as follows:
• System temperatures
Representative dish focus temperature as well as both ex-
tracting unit inlet (to the extracting unit) and outlet (from the
extracting unit) steam temperatures added to boiler outlet steam
temperature versus experimental hours were given in Figs. 4–
6. The obtained results showed that the system was capable to
produce 455 to 697 ◦ C temperatures at the focus of the parabolic
solar concentrated dish collector within the solar radiation ranged
of 600 to 950 W/m2 .
The obtained results also showed that during the working
day hours, the temperature difference was higher for the inlet
steam temperature comparing to outlet steam temperature un-
der all experimental conditions. This variation in extracting unit
inlet and outlet steam temperatures happened because the steam
inside the extracting unit moved around and inside the plant
to extract the volatile oil causing a reduction in outlet steam
temperature compared to inlet steam temperature. The extracting
unit inlet steam temperatures reached to the maximum value
of 100 ◦ C at 13.0 pm under conditions of 1.25 and 1.50 l/h
boiler inlet water flow rates with 400, 600 and 800 g batch sizes,
respectively. While it reached its minimum value of 92 ◦ C at 12.0
pm under 1.50 l/h water flow rate and 600 g batch size. The
obtained results also indicated that there was a little variation of
boiler outlet steam temperatures and extracting unit inlet steam
temperatures. This means that the system was constructed in
such a way to avoid any heat loss between the boiler and the
extracting unit.
• System efficiency
The system efficiency at various lavender plant batch sizes for
different boiler inlet water flow rates was shown in Fig. 7.
It was clarified that increasing the boiler inlet water flow
rate from 1.00 to 1.25 l/h, increased the system efficiency from
44.52 to 53.65%, from 38.92 to 51.14% and from 42.48 to 60.25%
under batch sizes of 400, 600 and 800 g, respectively. Any further
increase in boiler inlet water flow rate more than 1.25 up to 1.50,
decreased system efficiency from 53.65 to 51.80, 51.14 to 49.78%
and from 60.25 to 54.76% under the same previous conditions,
at the same order. So, the following relationship described the
situation between the system efficiency and the boiler inlet water
flow rate: The system efficiency was increased by increasing
water flow rate from 1.00 to 1.25 l/h and it was decreased by
increasing water flow rate from 1.25 to 1.50 l/h.
While, the following relationship described the situation be-
tween the system efficiency and the plant batch size: the system
M.N. Radwan, M.M. Morad, M.M. Ali et al.
Fig. 4. Effect of batch size on system temperatures under constant boiler inlet
water flow rate of 1.00 l/h.
efficiency was decreased by increasing batch size from 400 to 600
g and it was increased by increasing batch size from 600 to 800
g.
The variation in system efficiency with the difference of both
water flow rate and batch size was attributed to the variation
of solar radiation during day hours throughout the experimental
days. Added to that, the variation in system efficiency was also
due to the difference in the amount of steam consumed for the
oil extracting operation that affects the required power and as
a result, affects system efficiency. The obtained values of the
constructed solar system efficiency were so far good enough and
in agreement with Munir and Hensel (2010), who found that
the average efficiency of the solar distillation system was about
33.21%.
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Fig. 5. Effect of batch size on system temperatures under constant boiler inlet
water flow rate of 1.25 l/h.
3.3. Operational performance of the solar steam distillation system
Operational performance of the solar steam distillation sys-
tem was measured by recording system productivity, extraction
efficiency and essential oil yield as follows:
• Hourly and cumulative system productivity
The hourly system productivity at various lavender plant batch
sizes for different boiler inlet water flow rates versus experi-
mental hours was shown in Fig. 8. The maximum hourly system
productivity was 3.3 ml/h at 13.0 and 14.0 pm under conditions
of 1.50 l/h boiler inlet water flow rate and 800 g batch size. While
its minimum value was 0.5 ml/h at 12.0 pm under conditions of
1.50 l/h boiler inlet water flow rate and 600 g batch size.
It was observed from results that, increasing the boiler inlet
water flow rate from 1.00 to 1.50 l/h at 13.0 pm, increased the
hourly system. This may be due to the increase of the generated
amount of steam that accelerating the steam motion inside the
extracting unit to move around and inside the plant, which al-
lowing extraction of volatile oil easily. Regarding the use of batch
M.N. Radwan, M.M. Morad, M.M. Ali et al.
Fig. 6. Effect of batch size on system temperatures under constant boiler inlet
water flow rate of 1.50 l/h.
Fig. 7. Effect of batch size and water flow rate on system efficiency.
size, results explained that increasing batch size from 400 to 800
g, increased hourly system productivity from 1.2 to 2.8, from 1.8
to 2.9 and from 2.6 to 3.3 ml/h under boiler inlet water flow rates
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Fig. 8. Effect of batch size and water flow rate on hourly system productivity.
of 1.00, 1.25 and 1.50 l/h, respectively at 13.0 pm. The extracted
volatile oil was increased by a large amount of plant batch and
so, the hourly system productivity was increased.
The cumulative system productivity as illustrated in Fig. 9
was affected by both batch size and boiler inlet water flow
rate throughout experimental hours. The maximum cumulative
system productivity was 7.4 ml at 15.0 pm under conditions of
1.50 l/h boiler inlet water flow rate and 800 g batch size. While
the minimum value was 0.5 ml at 12.0 pm under 1.50 l/h boiler
inlet water flow rate and 600 g batch size.
Obtained data explained that the cumulative system produc-
tivity was increased from 2.9 to 3.4, from 5 to 5.4 ml and from
7 to 7.4 ml by increasing the boiler inlet water flow rate from
1.00 to 1.50 l/h at 14.0 pm under batch sizes of 400, 600 and
800 g, in the same arrangement. As to the effect of batch size,
the obtained data showed that the highest cumulative system
productivity batch size was obtained under a batch size of 800
g at 14.0 pm.
Results also noticed that the solar system required two hours
for extracting oil from a batch size of 400 g. While required
M.N. Radwan, M.M. Morad, M.M. Ali et al.
Fig. 9. Effect of batch size and water flow rate on cumulative system
productivity.
approximately three and four hours for extracting oil from batch
sizes of 600 and 800 g, respectively.
• Extraction efficiency
Fig. 10 illustrated the effect of both lavender plant batch size
and boiler inlet water flow rate on the extraction efficiency.
It was evident that the extraction efficiency was increased by
increasing either the boiler inlet water flow rate or batch size. The
extraction efficiency was increased from 70.63 to 77.19%, from
82.92 to 95.21% and from 95.31 to 98.91% by increasing flow rate
from 1.00 to 1.50 l/h under batch sizes of 400, 600 and 800 g,
respectively. The increase in extraction efficiency by increasing
the boiler inlet water flow rate was attributed to the increase
of the generated steam that accelerating and improving the oil
extraction operation Increasing batch size from 400 to 800 g,
increased the extraction efficiency from 70.63 to 95.31%, from
71.88 to 98.13% and from 77.19 to 98.91% under boiler inlet water
flow rates of 1.00, 1.25 and 1.50 l/h, respectively.
• Essential oil yield
The essential oil yield for the lavender plant under different
batch sizes and water flow rates was shown in Fig. 11.
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Fig. 10. Effect of batch size and water flow rate on extraction efficiency.
Fig. 11. Effect of batch size and water flow rate on essential oil yield.
Table 2
Some chemical properties of final lavender volatile oil.
Properties Quality standards Values
Linalool (%) 25.0–38.0 37.6
Linalyl acetate (%) 25.0–45.0 18.4
Camphor (%) 0.0–0.5 7.3
Terpineol-4-ol (%) 2.0–6.0 3.3
Cymene (%) 4.0–10 5.4
Results appeared that the highest essential oil yields were
0.618, 0.762 and 0.791% (w/w) using boiler inlet water flow rate
of 1.50 l/h, under batch sizes of 400, 600 and 800 g, respectively.
Increasing batch size from 400 to 800 g, the essential oil yield
was increased. The increase of essential oil yield by increasing
both boiler inlet flow rate and lavender plant batch size was
due to the increase of the generated steam that facilitating to
extract most of the volatile oil especially in the case of high batch
sizes. The range of essential oil yield obtained by the constructed
solar distillation system was approximately similar or higher than
the values of oil yield obtained by Cassel et al. (2009) that used
a mathematical model for predicting the essential oil efficiency
by steam distillation of lavender and found that the yield value
obtained for lavender oil was about 0.32% (w/w).
3.4. Final lavender oil quality
The solar steam distillation of the whole lavender plant gave
a yellow bright liquid. Some chemical properties of lavender
volatile oil were obtained under optimum conditions of 1.25 l/h
water flow rate and 800 g batch size as shown in Table 2.
The obtained product quality was compared to the quality
standards for the composition of lavender oil by the International
Organization for Standardization (ISO 3515:2002) (Anonimous,
2002). It was revealed that the chemical properties of lavender
M.N. Radwan, M.M. Morad, M.M. Ali et al.
Table 3
Comparison between the product quality of the lavender volatile oil ex-
tracted by the constructed system and the extraction system made by
Pinto et al. (2007).
Properties The constructed The extraction system
extraction system by Pinto et al. (2007)
Linalool (%) 37.6 33.7
Linalyl acetate (%) 18.4 2.2
Camphor (%) 7.3 7.8
Terpineol-4-ol (%) 3.3 3.3
Cymene (%) 5.4 0.4
volatile oil extracted by the constructed solar system was ap-
proximately met the quality standards. It appeared from results
that Linalool content was higher than Linalyl acetate content.
The contents of Linalool, Terpineol-4-ol and Cymene were in
agreement with ISO 3515:2002 lavender oil standards. While
Linalyl acetate content in the lavender plant was lower than ISO
3515:2002 lavender oil standards. The content of Camphor did
not meet ISO 3515:2002 lavender oil standards. The volatile oil
composition of the lavender plant varied relying on many factors,
among them the oil extraction technology (Pinto et al., 2007).
Table 3 illustrated the obtained chemical properties of lavender
volatile oil extracted by the constructed system compared to the
extraction system made by Pinto et al. (2007).
From this point of view, it is noticed that extracting lavender
oil using the constructed solar steam distillation system is so far
improved the extracted oil quality.
4. Conclusions
A solar steam distillation system for extracting lavender
volatile oil was constructed from low-cost local material.
The obtained experimental results revealed that system pro-
ductivity (7.3 ml), system efficiency (60.25%), extraction effi-
ciency (98.13%) and essential oil yield (0.785% (w/w)) were in the
optimum region under conditions of 1.25 l/h water flow rate and
800 g batch size.
The solar steam distillation system required two hours for
extracting oil from a batch size of 400 g, while required approxi-
mately three and four hours for extracting oil from batch sizes of
600 and 800 g, respectively.
Due to the obtained results, it is recommended to use the
solar steam distillation system for extracting lavender volatile
oil because of its high extraction efficiency accompanied by high
product quality.
Funding statement
This research did not receive any specific grant from funding
agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
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Energy Reports 6 (2020) 3080–3087
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Mona N. Radwan: Conception and design, Acquisition of data,
Analysis and interpretation of data, Writing - original draft. M.M.
Morad: Conception and design, Analysis and interpretation of
data, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing. M.M.
Ali: Acquisition of data, Writing - original draft, Writing - review
& editing. Kamal I. Wasfy: Conception and design, Analysis and
interpretation of data, Writing - original draft, Writing - review
& editing.
Declaration of competing interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgment
M.M. Morad, M.M. Ali, and Kamal I. Wasfy approved the final
version to be published.
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