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Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 3 - NewFert (Nutrient recovery from biobased Waste for Fertilizer production)

Teaser

Summary

Biowaste constitutes a significant challenge being under-utilized as potential resource of valuable chemical compounds. Turning waste into resources is key to a circular economy. In particular, biowaste valorisation is an attractive approach which can offer potentially useful alternatives for dealing with residues.
There is a need of contribution to maximize nutrient management for global sustainable development. From this perspective, the previously mentioned advanced valorisation strategies, enabling the recovery of valuable chemical compounds from biowaste, is the main subject in response to the transition to a sustainable and eco-friendly nutrient management. In this way the main objective of the project is to build up a breakthrough concept of Fertiliser Industry, strengthening European competitiveness and boosting the biobased economy potential in Europe, through the development of a new value chain based on nutrient recovery bioprocesses from waste streams for manufacturing biobased NPK fertilizers.
NEWFERT project involves the design and development of different enabling technologies to allow the re-use and valorisation from biowaste making them suitable as secondary raw material in the fertilizer industry.
In this sense two main processes have been developed: a more efficient technology for phosphate recovery through the production of struvite from liquid streams and a nutrient recovery process from solid waste that also provides materials for fertilizer factory.
A new family of biobased NPK fertilizers has been designed as the main project outcome, to be produced in the fertilizer factory. The obtained NPK fertilisers have been agronomically tested in trials with plants, leading to the conclusion that, overall, it is possible to substitute the conventional raw materials by the new bio-based ones, without reduction of the fertilizer efficiency.

Work performed

The first step was an intensively search of the European industry landscape -municipal and agricultural waste management- to identify promising sources of biobased residues. The result was a total of 23 different samples of residues that have been chemically and physically analyzed and characterized. Acceptability criteria for possible biobased residues have been defined, in order to identify possible new feedstocks for the fertilizer production.
Great part of the work was dedicated to the study of nutrient recovery from solid waste providing materials potentially suitable for application and feed material for fertilizer production. Its main purpose is to identify feasible bio-solid waste (like waste incineration ashes) in order to extract phosphorous/nitrogen/potassium eligible for NPK fertilizer use, select the optimum chemical extraction process and design the industrial process for chemical nutrients extraction process suitable to be used in the already existing NPK fertilizer plant. An important outcome of the project was the design of a new chemical nutrients extraction process, including the design and construction of a test bench to set up the designed process. With the results obtained, it was possible to design the industrial process for chemical nutrients extraction process suitable to be use in existing NPK fertilizer plant.
Regarding to liquid wastes a semi-industrial scale pilot has been implemented in an anaerobic digestion unit at a pig farm in Morbihan (France) with the objective of recover struvite. The bio-based raw materials obtained were granulated to obtain the NEWFERTâ€™s NPK fertilizers.
Finally, the agronomic trials indicated that the substitution of the raw materials produced, overall, a fertilizer efficiency similar to that of the conventional NPK fertilizers with the same equilibrium.
In relation to the exploitation results NEWFERT has developed a new innovative technology to recover nutrients from bio-waste in the fertiliser industry. One of the technologies for nutrients recovery, has been patented by D&M and Fertiberia (EP17382535.7: PROCESS AND INSTALLATION FOR THE RECOVERY OF PHOSPHORUS FROM WASTE INCINERATION ASH, date of embargo: 02/02/2019). Proman will increase its experience in consultancy about waste as source of raw materials to design fertilisers. IRSTEA has developed a new and more efficient technology for phosphate recovery through the production of struvite. University of Leon will develop a new more efficient technology for nitrogen reduction through the bioelectrochemical systems and KWB will increase its knowledge about the fertiliser process and will increase its possibilities of offering consultancy in this subject.
The project partners have participated in more than ninety activities throughout the life of the project: organization of a conference and workshop, press release, flyer, website, participation in different conferences, workshops and trade fair.

Final results

Biowastes suitable for processing to commercial fertilizers by industrial companies have been identified making sure that the project can have a relevant industrial impact. A replacement of 15-20% of the total volume of nutrients has been achieved when using recycled nutrients alone. Conventional solubilization processes has been modified and optimized in order to obtain the maximum extraction capacity as well as the appropriate product for the industry. Novel technologies related to P and N recovery from pig slurry have been developed and optimized. These processes will contribute to the technological development within the project due to the high novelty of both extraction methods.
Nutrient recovery can be a preferred option for systems suffering from nutrient excess and high COD, N and P-loaded streams. In the cost estimation the P-recovery with a struvite reactor is the least expensive scenario to face nutrient surplus.
The introduction of bio-based materials into an NPK plant cannot only substitute nutrients, it can also be associated with an environmental benefit due to substituted primary nutrient production, and however, this margin is in principle low, especially for potassium. With the given raw material and energy prizes, the production of 1 ton NPK 15-15-15 fertilizer with primary raw material costs 284 EUR/t. If nutrients from secondary bio-based waste materials are used, the specific production costs are reduced by 2- 11 % depending on the secondary material. To foster nutrient recovery widely, it is necessary to ensure material availability is not limited. Only with some types of treatment steps (as demonstrated via AshDec or DMphos) larger quantities of nutrients can be recovered and recycled in fertilizer industry. For FERTIBERIA, these processes and others turning unavailable nutrients into available forms must be evaluated specifically due to the availability of chemicals and energy and also related to the amount of secondary nutrients FERTIBERIA needs at Huelva in future projects.
New technologies, products and value-chains will have socio-economic impact. Europeâ€™s intended transformation towards a sustainable circular economy will strongly rely on sustainable value chains. The project will contribute in form of sustainable and resource efficient production schemes and better fertilizer products compared to traditional ones. Improved fertilizer products and fertilizing procedures will provide benefits for both, human health and environment.