Supercritical fluid extraction of lipids from spent coffee grounds was studied in this work. Extraction experiments were carried out with supercritical carbon dioxide at different pressure and temperature conditions to study the influence of those process parameters on the extraction rate and oil composition. Supercritical carbon dioxide extracted up to 85% of the total amount of oil of spent coffee grounds after 3 h of extraction (corresponding to a maximum yield of 15-4g(oil)/100g(dry) (spent) (coffee)). The fatty acid composition of the extracted oil showed the presence of fatty acids of C14, C16, C18, and C20 carbon chains. Palmitic (C16:0) and linoleic (C18:2) acids were the major fatty acids and comprise about 35% each of the total fatty acid content of the oil. A soxhlet extraction with n-hexane was done for comparison resulting in a maximum yield of oil of 18.3 g(oil)/100g(dry) (spent) (coffee). Finally, a diffusional model that takes into account the properties of the substrate, the solute partition between the solid and the supercritical phase, and the mass transfer coefficient and axial dispersion in the fluid phase was applied to this system and a good agreement with experimental results was obtained. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.