Depuis quelques années, le domaine de l’extraction végétale est en pleine mutation, avec à la fois un intérêt croissant des consommateurs pour des ingrédients d’origine naturelle, combiné à des préoccupations environnementales. Il apparaît dès lors indispensable de remplacer les procédés actuels utilisant des solvants pétrochimiques nocifs par de nouveaux procédés d’extraction réduisant le besoin énergétique, la toxicité du solvant et la quantité de déchets tout en s’assurant du rendement et de la qualité de l’extrait obtenu. L’objectif de cette thèse a donc consisté à développer un nouveau procédé d’extraction mettant en œuvre des gaz liquéfiés comme solvants. Ce manuscrit présentera tout d’abord l’état de l’art sur les gaz liquéfiés existants et leur mise en œuvre pour l’extraction des produits naturels. A l’issue de cette présentation, 3 gaz liquéfiés ont été sélectionnés (n-butane, HFO-1234ze et le DME) comme solvants pour mener des essais au laboratoire, grâce à un prototype dont la conception est détaillée dans le chapitre II. Dans un second temps, les essais réalisés à l’aide de ces gaz liquéfiés pour l’extraction de composés lipophiles ont été décrits. L’approche expérimentale a été couplée à une approche prédictive par l’utilisation d’outils d’aide à la décision : les paramètres de solubilité de Hansen et le modèle COSMO-RS. La prédiction théorique ainsi que les essais expérimentaux ont confirmé l’intérêt des gaz liquéfiés pour la solubilisation et l’extraction de composés lipophiles d’intérêt biologique et à haute valeur ajoutée. Parallèlement l’étude des impacts du procédé sur l’environnement, la qualité, la réglementation et la sécurité ont montré que l’extraction par gaz liquéfié était un procédé facilement transposable à l’échelle industrielle. / In recent years, the industrial sector of vegetable extraction has been evolving due to the growing interest of consumers for natural food ingredients combined with growing environmental concerns. Therefore, it seems essential to replace existing processes using toxic petroleum bases solvents with greener extraction processes with lower energy consumption, less wastes but higher extract quality. The objective of this thesis has consisted in the research and development of a new extraction process using liquefied gases as liquid solvents. First, this manuscript will outline the state of the art on the liquefied gases and how they are used for extraction of natural products. After this survey, 3 liquefied gases (n-butane, HFO-1234ze and DME) have been selected for laboratory scale experiments performed using a dedicated extraction unit whose design is detailed in chapter II. Then, the tests performed with these 3 gases for extraction of lipophilic compounds from several plant materials has been described. The experimental approach has been combined with a predictive one using decision tools: Hansen Solubility Parameters and COSMO-RS model. This survey demonstrated that liquefied gases are interesting solvents for solubilization and extraction of lipophilic compounds of interest. In parallel, the impacts of the process on environment, safety regulation and quality showed that liquefied gas extraction could be easily transposed at industrial scale.

<p dir="ltr">Energy consciousness initiatives have seen a recent uptick to curb the ever growing concerns of global warming. Heat Pumps are a crucial piece of technology for these efforts, as they consume lower energy than the requirement they satisfy and are typically used for refrigeration and HVAC systems. Hybrid Heat Pump Water Heater (HPWH) technologies have seen increased adoption, and the improvement of these technologies could pay dividends in the long run. </p><p dir="ltr">This project explores the optimal design space of HPWHs within the context of the Department of Energy Guidelines for their performance rating and compares several up and coming refrigerants with lower GWP than the current market dominant refrigerant, R-134a, to provide consistent performance with improvements on the environmental front along with potential cost improvements on the manufacturing front. For this purpose, Dymola, a simulation software that employs the Modelica language for modeling complex dynamic systems, is employed to study the transient behavior of a market example Heat Pump Water Heater. </p><p dir="ltr">The results of these simulations were validated using experimental data gathered in the laboratory using relevant instrumentation on the physical device and manufacture specified performance ratings to compare the validity of the simulation results. The results of the study indicated the presence of a multi-dimensional design space with a defined set of possible combinations for device implementation. Within that feasible region, there exist multiple trajectories of iso-preference which alter the overall device performance, and the careful study of these parameters and their implications on the device performance can lead to a more robust design pathway for future improvements of the device. The work also contextualizes these improvements by quantifying the relative importance of different parameters upon the final performance of the device, showing how to identify which parameters to focus on when embarking upon an improvement journey. Additionally, preliminarily ideal specifications for the device operation under different refrigerants studied were also identified to provide similar or better performance to the current device. </p><p dir="ltr">The study showed that when matching mass flux rates, R-152a, R-290, and R-600a outperform R-134a in terms of expected COP. Of the 3, only R-290 uses a smaller compressor size than the baseline R-134a cycle for achieving the required heating capacity. The other refrigerants studied do not improve upon the COP of the cycle, but do have benefits over R-134a in terms of their respective GWPs. </p><p dir="ltr">The results suggest that with the considered alterations, R-290 systems within the current charge restrictions (<150g) can be developed and achieve the same heating performance with slight improvements on COP and therefore potentially UEF values. </p><p dir="ltr">The study also shows that all refrigerants considered could achieve the required heating capacity with a considerably downsized condenser and appropriately reduced subcooling. It highlighted the trends being consistent across refrigerants and implemented a final alternative refrigerant through the identified optimization steps to arrive at a new configuration without revalidating the trends, showing that newer optimal configurations could be identified with minimal time spent in the simulation environment. </p><p dir="ltr">Finally, the study explored alternative control possibilities by way of overheating the water beyond its required setpoint and enabling a control based mixing at the outlet to reduce the energized time of the device and leveraging the exceptional insulation capabilities for thermal storage.</p>