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Squalane Manufacturing Assistance Please
Please can someone tell me how to best make squalane from olives or even from sugar cane?
(I’ve no idea how to get started / what equipment is needed).
Kindest regards and thank you so much for responding!
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14 Replies
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Get a chemistry degree and a lab cause it’s not that easy. If you are looking for the easy way, get shark oil, a reverse phase MPLC, hydrogen gas, Raney nickel and a pressure tank.
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Dear Pharma,
I really appreciate you taking the time to reply to my inquiry.
Oh gosh, I hadn’t anticipated someone saying how difficult it is?
Unfortunately, completing a Chemistry degree wouldn’t be possible for me (I’m not smart enough).
Manufacturing Squalane is completely ‘outside’ of my box, but I would really like to start doing it as it has great benefits for the skin and I have a ton of olives to use!
Might you know anyone who can process Squalane from olives or at least best advise?
Kindest regards and thank you! -
Okay, tons of olives is already something most don’t have 🙂 .Do you process these to oil yourself? Ask around in your neighbourhood who can fractionate/distillate/refine (olive) oil. The required by-product is olive oil deodorised distillate (= OODD, you might also be able to source it directly from an oil refinery). OODD is highly enriched in squalane and serves as main starting material for further isolation/purification steps which do vary depending on available equipment, cost, batch size etc. HERE some reading, although a scientific publication, it’s not too techy/nerdy.Another strategy is to simply use the OODD directly since it contains a bunch of other goodies. Might be worth to have it analysed so you know +/- what’s in there
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Oh thank you so much Pharma for your detailed message and kind encouragement ?!
Your time and input are greatly appreciated !!!
Sadly, after asking around the olive mills no one has even heard of Squalane (I live in Cyprus and thought it was going to be easy to start doing this). I’ll start reading the journal you’ve kindly and hopefully, find a way to get started …
Sincere smile and gratitude, really!
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Pharma said:Okay, tons of olives is already something most don’t have 🙂 .Do you process these to oil yourself? Ask around in your neighbourhood who can fractionate/distillate/refine (olive) oil. The required by-product is olive oil deodorised distillate (= OODD, you might also be able to source it directly from an oil refinery). OODD is highly enriched in squalane and serves as main starting material for further isolation/purification steps which do vary depending on available equipment, cost, batch size etc. HERE some reading, although a scientific publication, it’s not too techy/nerdy.Another strategy is to simply use the OODD directly since it contains a bunch of other goodies. Might be worth to have it analysed so you know +/- what’s in there .
what exctly IS OODD?
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Cyprus? My wife spend 5 years of her life there! I’ve never been on Cyprus but it must be beautiful!Anyway: Don’t ask for squalane but who refines olive oil instead of producing virgin olive oil. Don’t tell them that one of the main waste products of refining (the last step is a distillation/deodorisation with water vapour) is an actual treasure or they’re going to keep it for themselves :smiley: ! Now, said by-product, the olive oil deodorizer distillate aka OODD, is a greasy/resiny/ugly/sticky/dark/smelly substance composed of many things such as unsaponifiables (sterols, tocopherols, and squalane), free fatty acids and mono- and diglycerides amongst other constituents (HERE‘s another reading with an easy to understand flow chart). Removing these compounds from oil makes it look and smell “better” (I don’t like it, it’s “empty” and tasteless) and increases stability and shelf life (on the other hand, it removes tocopherols and antioxidants and might actually ruin oxidation stability). It’s useful mostly for oils with a natural unpleasant taste or appearance. Chemically or high-temp extracted (cheap) olive oil is an example which requires refining because of bitter (I think it’s bitter but I’m not entirely sure) taste, almond oil is another oil which is often refined to increase shelf life. The resulting refined olive oil is rather bland and lacks that special, unique taste of good olive oil (refined almond and sunflower oils are also fairly tasteless and hence better suited for creams). As a side note, some oils are refined because they are toxic otherwise .
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Wow! Pharma, thank you so much for the information (written and attached).
It’s lovely your wife has visited the island!
Gosh, I didn’t know Squalane was considered a dietary cancer preventative treatment.
Ref deodorized distillate - do you think those who refine the olive oil would be able to use their process technology to help me or would you say I need to create this extra feature Process technology for olive oil extraction is crazy expensive, but I haven’t come across the actual machinery for Squalane - unless we can just take it from the refining process ?
Pharma, you are giving me much to consider and also great hope(!) - thank you sincerely for sharing your vast knowledge!!! -
I did a quick&dirty google maps search and found 4 hits:1 without a homepage2 only selling native organic oilAnd THIS ONE YOU CERTAINLY WANT TO CONTACT . They should be able to answer all your questions.
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Oh wow, Pharma you are incredibly kind and generous to help me ?
thank you sincerely for taking your time and expertise to guide me closer towards my dream ❤️
Sincere regards and gratitude,
Have a lovely weekend !!
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You’re welcome!Should you ever get it working (I wish you all the best that you do), just send me a bottle of your best olive oil 🙂 .
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Oh wow- that’s a promise Pharma! Gosh, I hope we can get this going - will definitely try our best ?
Have a brilliant week and thank you again for sharing your time and expertise !
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As far as I’m aware, only squalene is available from olive oil. To get squalane, you have to hydrogenate high-purity squalene. The former is shelf-stable, the latter is quite easily oxidised.
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Good point @CriticalMicelle ! Although, both are constituents of plant oils. I do not know % in olive oil but now that I think about it, squalene might really be present at higher amounts than squalane.
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