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Nutrients cycling for sustainability

In the face of climate change and eutrophication of water bodies, the Baltic Sea region’ society faces the challenge of recovering and obtaining nutrients. The Baltic Sea coastal zone is reach in biomass resources, such as algae, macrophytes and mussel shells, which could be used in agriculture for food production in sustainable way. It is in light of recent years rising interest in “nutrient circularity”, “closing the nutrient loop” and “circular nutrient solutions”. Circular nutrient solutions will prevent fertilizing nutrients from being dissipated in the environment and becoming pollutants. The idea of nutrients’ cycling includes the use of biomass as raw material for fertilizer and further food production. Fertilizer technologies have increasingly used renewable resources, most manufactured products are still based on mineral deposits. The use efficiency of synthetic fertilizers is often only 50% with N and P losses from crop systems polluting the biosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere. To reduce dependency on inorganic fertilizer use, organic fertilizers such as animal manure, biosolids, digestate, biochar and crop residues are used as alternatives. These complex materials have caused pollution/ecological risks associated with veterinary antibiotics, heavy metals such as (Cu and Zn) and other contaminants such as arsenic. Nutrient losses from agricultural land to freshwater and marine environments contribute to eutrophication and leads to the growth of algae. The potential benefits of recycling the biomass for agricultural land and soil quality, and crop nutrition in a “cycling manner” could be very good contribution for green and blue technologies as well as circular initiatives in the South Baltic region. The seed money project is useful instrument to recognize potential partners and form consortium, to prepare the application form and elaborate future plan of activities in order to achieve project’s targets and aim.

Details

Project's acronym:
NUTCY
Financial Program Name:
Europejska Współpraca Terytorialna i Europejski Instrument Sąsiedztwa
Organization:
Wspólny Sekretariat Techniczny Programu Południowy Bałtyk
Realisation period:
unknown - unknown
Research team leader:
dr inż. Andrzej Rogala
Realised in:
Department of Process Engineering and Chemical Technology
External institutions
participating in project:
  • Klaipeda University (Lithuania)
  • Lithuanian Research Centre for Agriculture and Forestry (Lithuania)
  • Kristianstad University (Sweden)
Request type:
European Founds
Domestic:
Domestic project
Verified by:
Gdańsk University of Technology

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