BIOREFINE Project – Recovery of useful nutrients from organic wastes produced in five European countries (3AV.3.55)

At this time, many wastes are used or eliminated through processes that do not really consider their potential applications. Such wastes contain useful nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium), the importance of which has been demonstrated in agriculture for many years. The composition of wastes is highly heterogeneous, which makes treatment techniques more difficult to apply on a large scale. Sewage sludge is usually used as a fertilizer in agriculture, in energy production or in the field of construction. The main use of manure is agriculture, although considerable amounts of nutrients are lost and cause pollution. Digestate is also used in agriculture, but other alternatives have been proposed. Ashes should also be highlighted, although they do not contain nitrogen, which is lost into the atmosphere during the combustion process. Finally, household and industrial wastes are resources that should be considered as well. Those different types of wastes could be recycled to produce environment-friendly fertilizers. Here, we propose to investigate these opportunities inside five European countries (Belgium, France, Germany, United Kingdom and The Netherlands) through five work packages with the BioRefine Project.