UC DAVIS turns oil into body care products,UC DAVIS body care products,

  UC DAVIS turns oil into body care products
A graduate of UC Davis is helping her alma mater produce soaps and lotions made with olive oil from campus trees.
The olive oil based body-care products -- lotion, soap, body butter and lip balm -- are now on sale at the UC Davis bookstore. Proceeds will support the UC Davis Olive Center's research and education program.
The olive oil used in the products, which range in price from $4 to $12.95 each, would otherwise have gone to waste.
"It was premium olive oil, but because it was not processed in a facility certified for food production, we had to either find an alternate use for it or pour it down the drain," said Dan Flynn, executive director of the olive center.
The center contacted Kacie Klein, a 2003 graduate from UC Davis with a degree in design. She produces a line of body care products under the Panacea brand.
Klein agreed to take the UC Davis oil an use it to produce the inaugural line of products at cost to the Olive Center for sale at the bookstore.
The products are scented with a variety of botanical fragrances from peppermint to citrus, according to a university press release.
The body-care products can also be ordered online at the UC Davis bookstore's Web site.
The campus has been producing olive oil from its 2,000 olive trees for years.
"This is a great opportunity to demonstrate how a simple byproduct of olive processing can be used to produce a useful commodity," said Flynn.