The European Commission Investment Plan / European Investment Bank (EIB) has identified nutrient recycling and phosphorus management as a priority area for project funding. A first project has already achieved provisional approval, presented by COOPERL (Brittany, France, farmers’ cooperative).
The METHATRAC project combines new generation piggeries equipped with TRAC scraping process, anaerobic digestion of the manure with slaughterhouse waste and municipal sewage to produce biogas and processing of the digestate to a valuable agricultural fertiliser product.
The 16 million € project will treat over 38 000 tonnes of pig manure (110 000 pigs). 55% of manure nitrogen (490 tonnes N/year) and 90% of phosphorus (430 tonnes P/year) will be captured and recycled as fertiliser. 7.6 million m3/year of biogas will be generated. Process water will be purified and recycled (reverse osmosis).
The TRAC piggery system reduces nitrogen climate gas emissions, improves animal and worker welfare (reduced NH4) and facilitates manure treatment for nutrient recycling. 40 such installations are already operational in Brittany. 125 tonnes/year of NH3 volatisation will be avoided in the METHATRAC project piggeries and net emissions of nearly 28 000 tonnes CO2 saved.
This project will accelerate sustainability in Brittany’s specialist intensive agriculture. Already today Brittany's farmers process over 400 000 tonnes of manure per year (processed weight, 50 – 90% dry matter), producing organic fertilisers specifically adapted for different crop needs and transported to other regions of France. In total, Brittany’s 1 100 farms generate livestock manure containing around 200 000 tonnes of nitrogen (N) and 120 000 tonnes of phosphorus (P).
EU Investment Plan / EIB loans are available for high-risk, market ready private investments of significant scale (generally > 15 million €). Nutrient recycling is identified as a target area for new project funding.
EU Investment Plan http://ec.europa.eu/priorities/jobs-growth-investment/plan/index_en.htm
For information about possible nutrient recycling project funding loans under this plan, contact ESPP.