What is ManureEcoMine? The project, its challenges and objectives

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1 ManureEcoMine Newsletter Issue 1 December 2014 Dear reader, We welcome you to the first issue of the ManureEcoMine Newsletter. ManureEcoMine is a 3-years project that aims to recover nutrients from manure and blend them into green fertilizers. The project is funded by the European Commission under the Seventh Framework Programme (grant agreement no ). We are glad to invite you to the open days of the ManureEcoMine demonstration plant in Axel, The Netherlands, on Friday 17 April 2015 and Saturday 18 April For more information on the ManureEcoMine project, please visit the website IN THIS ISSUE What is ManureEcoMine? - The project, its challenges and objectives Nutrient and energy mining from livestock manure - which are the waste streams used in ManureEcoMine and their potentialities? Research support for the ManureEcoMine pilot installation how has research helped the construction of the manure processing demonstration plant? Who is ManureEcoMine: people and institutions - in this issue, we introduce you to Biogroup (Santiago de Compostela, Spain) and Peltracom (Ghent, Belgium) Dissemination So far and in the future What is ManureEcoMine? The project, its challenges and objectives European pigs and cows jointly produce about 1.27 billion tonnes of manure per year, corresponding to 500,000 Olympic swimming pools of manure. This represents a largely unexploited resource of organic carbon and nutrients and therefore an exquisite mining opportunity. ManureEcoMine proposes an integrated approach to the treatment and reuse of animal husbandry waste, by applying the ecoinnovative principles of sustainability, resource recovery and energy efficiency. Technologies of proven efficacy in the wastewater treatment field are combined in several process configurations to demonstrate their technological and environmental potential at pilot scale for cow and pig manure. To render the cradle-to-cradle approach complete, the effects of the green fertilizers will be established on plant growth, supported by quantification of emissions and safety management. Economic boundaries and life cycle analyses determine the most environmentally friendly technology and most effective and safe reuse strategy. 1

2 ManureEcoMine aims to provide farmers with the technical means to extract nutrient streams from their manure and to stimulate market uptake for manure nutrient recovery technologies and green high performance fertilizer. The project consortium is composed by 5 research institutions, 5 SMEs and 1 MNE. A pilot plant combines well established manure treatment technologies, aiming to demonstrate the economic, environmental and processing feasibility of the ManureEcoMine Nutrient and energy mining from livestock manure: which are the waste streams used in ManureEcoMine and their potentialities? Intensive livestock production requires intensive crop production, which imposes the use of (chemical) fertilizers to sustain the production. A large part of the nutrients assimilated into the crops is excreted by livestock and concentrated in the resulting manure. Direct application of manure to fields imposes risk of nitrate leaching into groundwater or direct runoff carrying nutrients, pathogens and other pollutants into surface water. Using manure as a nutrient source for slow-releasing fertilizers and green energy production would prevent such risks and restore nutrients to soil to guarantee the sustainability of the livestock production chain. Samples from both origins were exhaustively characterized to determine the nutrient content in both manures. Pig manure presented higher ph, conductivity and alkalinity than cow manure. The ManureEcoMine demonstration plant is tested tapping into two sources which are representative of the main types of manures and climates in Europe: pig manure from the Netherlands and cow manure from Spain Total N (measured as total Kjeldahl nitrogen or TKN) values rose up to 6 g TKN L -1 and 5 g TKN L -1 in pig and cow manure, respectively, with organic N fractions about 32-64% of the TKN in cow manure and 20-38% in pig manure. 2

3 By-product rich in fat and proteins, segregates (sugars and proteins), corn, corn silage and supermarket wastes mix were characterized as co-substrates for anaerobic co-digestion (AcoD) Regarding the main nutrients, P content in pig manure (up to 1.8 g TP L-1) was 3 fold higher than in cow manure, while K was above 2 g K L-1 and 4 g K L-1 in cow and pig manure, respectively. Other nutrients such as Ca and Mg were also abundant in both types of manure. Heavy metals analysis showed significant presence of zinc and copper in both manures. ammonium sulfate or ammonium nitrate. The presence of P, K and Mg in the manures enables the precipitation of ammonium or potassium struvite, slow releasing fertilizers, resulting in high assimilation efficiency by crops. However, more than 50% of P in manure is captured into the solid fraction and the solid/liquid separation after AcoD will be determinant for recovery as struvite. Besides P, N and K, other compounds such as Mg, Ca and organics can be present in the struvite, enhancing its fertilizing properties and the potential market interest Green electricity production The manure is fed into AcoD process for methane production and thus green electricity. Bio-methane production lab tests were used to explore the potential methane production. The biogas yields obtained with raw manures were no higher than 18 Nm3 CH4 Tn-1 substrate, while a production of 30 Nm3 CH4 Tn-1 substrate is recommended for economic profitability. Hence, manure is mixed with cosubstrates, ensuring electricity production exceeding the energy demand of the process. Research support for the pilot installation: how has research helped the design of the ManureEcoMine demonstration plant? For the accomplishment of the project, a demonstration plant has been designed and will be operated for 20 months, featuring different process combinations for an efficient and flexible manure nutrient recovery. Four research partners of the ManureEcoMine consortium have provided lab support for the design and construction of the pilot plant. Nutrients for fertilizer production Manure and co-substrates are rich in N and ammonia stripping is a suitable option for N-recovery as 3

4 The plant synergistically combines 5 Anaerobic co-digestion processes: Anaerobic digestion, Ammonia stripping, Solid-liquid separation, Struvite recovery, Biological nitrogen removal Anaerobic co-digestion AcoD (mesophilic or thermophilic) offers the opportunity to mineralize organic wastes, release nutrients and recover energy simultaneously. The AcoD unit is coupled to an ammonia stripping unit. Ammonia stripping The ManureEcoMine plant is equipped with an ammonia stripping unit, aiming to prevent the ammonia toxicity in the AcoD unit and provide the recovery of N as ammonium sulfate or ammonium nitrate. During the stripping part of the ammonia is transferred into a gas stream and captured in an acid liquid. The recovered N can be used as valuable source for growing media. Scheme of the ManureEcoMine recovery technology core of the demonstration plant, with two options for phosphorus recovery (P1 and P2) and residual nitrogen removal (N1 and N2). Solid-liquid separation The nutrient recovery processes require low levels of suspended solids in the digestate. Centrifugation followed by membrane separation appeared as the most suitable options, however they might compromise the permanence of P in the liquid phase. Therefore, the ManureEcoMine pilot is constructed featuring the possibility to test different separation techniques. Struvite recovery The struvite recovery unit aims to recover the main nutrients present in the digested manure and cosubstrates by promoting struvite (MgNH 4 PO 4 ) or K- struvite (KMgPO 4 ) crystallization and precipitation. The struvite recovery process can be placed both before (mainly struvite) and after (mainly K-struvite) the biological nitrogen removal. Biological nitrogen removal Although stages aimed to generate P fertilizers consume some ammonia nitrogen, about 90% remains dissolved, at levels above the discharge standards. For this reason, the biological nitrogen removal is a necessary step of the ManureEcoMine pipeline. Partial nitritation-anammox was selected for final N removal, since it is a well-established technology for the treatment of high strength ammoniac wastewaters However, the nitrification/denitrification option has also been included in the pilot installation. 4

5 Who is ManureEcoMine: people and institutions Group of Environmental Engineering and Bioprocesses (Biogroup), University of Santiago de Compostela (Spain) - The Group of Environmental Engineering and Bioprocesses belongs to the Department of Chemical Engineering of the University of Santiago de Compostela (Spain). It is composed of 9 professors, 6 postdoctoral researchers, 1 technological manager, 3 laboratory technicians, 1 administrative, ~30 PhD students, 5-10 students from foreign universities. Re- The mission of Biogroup is to provide a stimulating environment for generating scientific and technological knowledge and training entrepreneurial researchers footprint, eco-design of products, eco-labelling, declaration of "green" products. Treatment of gases in diffuse emissions: treat- ment of methane, VOCs and odours. search lines: Novel wastewater treatment technologies: removal of micropollutants, autotrophic denitrification (anammox process), aerobic granular reactors, anaerobic (co-)digestion, P recovery as struvite, etc. Biorefinery: biopolymers (PHB) and added-value products by bio-fermentation from molasses. Strategic programme: COST Action Water_2020, Novedar_Consolider network, Competitive Reference Group, REGATA network. Environmental Management: production systems, identification of improvement actions, carbon Peltracom n.v. - Peltracom has been involved in the horticultural sector for 30 years and has 400 employees. The company supplies more than a thousand carefully designed growing media. The wide range of growing media is marketed under the Peltracom brand for the professional market and Agrofino brand for the hobby market. In addition, Peltracom also produces peat, bark and soil improvers. Today, Peltracom has 9 production sites located in Europe. Quality assurance ensures the best possible estimates of emissions and sinks given the current state of scientific knowledge and data available, and support the effectiveness of the QC programme Peltracom is constantly striving for quality improvement, opting for a close-cycle approach for enhancing the quality of the substrates on an ongoing basis, thus strengthening the quality cycle. It owns 3,000 hectares of peat fields in Latvia and Poland to guarantee the continuous supply of topquality raw materials. With an annual production of 1.5 million m³ of growing media, Peltracom is ranked in Europe s top 5 companies in its sector. Oliver Grunert is Peltracom representative in ManureEcoMine. He has been working for Peltracom company since 2002, first as responsible for the quality control and later in the R&D department. 5

6 Dissemination main events of the past months December 2013 ManureEcoMine has been presented to the ManuREsource 2013 conference Bruges, Belgium ( February 2014 ManureEcoMine participated to the LCA workshop organized by Montanuniversität Leoben, Austria April 2014 June 2014 October 2014 October 2014 The Project consortium gathered in Hulst (The Netherlands) at Colsen BV facilities for the Month-6 project meeting ManureEcoMine is partner of the Biorefine Cluster Europe ( cluster) that gather several EC-projects in the field of wastewater processing, wastewater environmental impact, nutrient recovery from waste etc. The Project consortium gathered in Vienna (Austria) at BOKU and LVA facilities for the Month-12 project meeting ManureEcoMine research was present at the Biogas Science 2014, International Conference on Anaerobic Digestion Vienna, Austria (biogas2014.boku.ac.at) Dissemination main events in the future 17 April 2015 (afternoon) 18 April 2015 (morning) The project consortium is excited to announce the first open days of the ManureEcoMine Pilot Plant in Axel, The Netherlands Prof. Siegfried Vlaeminck Prof. Nico Boon Prof. Korneel Rabaey Dr. Cristina Pintucci Contacts Gent University, Laboratory of Microbial Ecology and Technology (LabMET) ManureEcoMine project is funded by the European Community s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/ ) under Grant Agreement n