Green Biorefineries for protein – bioenergy and biomaterials

Show video

good morning and welcome to this um seminar  on green refineries for biorefineries for   protein bio energy and biomaterials we meet at  a very special time in european history when the   economy of the european union is challenged  by the consequences of putin's invasion   in ukraine and the economic and supply  chain war that has resulted is giving us   in europe a difficult time regarding  supply of energy in particular but also   feedstock for the agriculture industry and  some raw materials we will not talk about   all the problems here today but we will discuss  those that are related to what is supplied by the agricultural and forestry sectors or what could  be supplied by these sectors in a more efficient   and for europe beneficial way we have a program  that is governed by a very tight time schedule   but the organizers have decided to try to  give some opportunity for discussion uh   after the technical session on biorefinery  systems in particular so we might   go on until 20 to 12 or even a quarter  to 12 but hopefully not longer than that   so as a moderator i do hope that the  speakers today will succeed in meeting the   extremely tough time schedule considering all  the content that i'm sure they would like to   convey during their few minutes  of attention at this seminar i introduced it by describing it as a european  challenge and common european interest in   successfully developing these bio refineries  and as introduces of today's seminars we have   two contributions from the european commission one  from the gg agriculture and rural development and   one from dg energy and i will first hand over the  screen to laura messier from dg agriculture and   rural development so the screen is yours so good  morning everybody so i will indeed present you uh   today the the state of the art um of eu plant  proteins i don't think you see my my my video   my screen but uh never mind i will i will proceed  and um and i will uh present you some highlights   on the commission work on plan pertains uh the  issue of eu uh party deficit is widely known   in the commission and the commission is working  on that you know an important mind stone was a   2018 report and we will talk about it in a few  minutes but before that what is why are planned   proteins are in the agenda because we need them as  you know to feed a livestock that's the reason we   are dependent on imported plant-based protein used  for feed in particular soya from south america the   graph here describes the level of crude protein  used for feeding our livestock in the eu you see   that roughage is the main source of protein for  livestock that's the green bar at the at the left   it is green which means it is produced in  the eu the second source of protein for a   livestock straw from cereals and and most of it  is produced in the eu and the third uh colon show   the extent of the eu dependency on soya meals  why is it a problem to be dependent on imported   plant protein because it comes from regions where  soya is participating to deforestation and it is   our responsibility to avoid that our consumption  contributes to negative environmental consequences   in third countries in case of political crisis it  also creates a problem of food security you will before presenting you the activities of the  commission in the in the area of plant-based   protein let me put this topic in the broader  context of the green deal presented by the   commission in 2019 the green deal include many  topics uh and actions and among which agriculture   which plays an important role in particular the  farm to fork strategy which is part of it it   was presented in may 2020 even if the word plant  protein does not appear in each page in the farm   to fork strategy it creates a favorable context  for the development of e-grown plant proteins   the the farm to fork set many ambitious targets  in this respect and in particular a significant   reduction of fertilizer by at least 20 percent  by 2030 um and a rediction of nutrient losses   by at least 50 percent by that date and the  farm to fork plans to boost organic production   indeed by 2030 organic production will reach 25  percent that's the objective of agricultural lands the commission report now we are  going to tackle the commission report   published in 2018 highlights  different market opportunities for the for plant protein and and also show some  drivers for the development um and then we'll at   the end of the report you will find some follow-up  actions uh which are listed in the conclusion and   and then we'll quickly go through them the  first action concern the cap strategic plan   the the commission uh planned in that report  to help member states integrating plant protein   interventions in the cap strategic plans all the  plans as you know have been communicated to the   commission uh which are examining them some of  them have been adopted approved sorry recently   and the cap provides several tools for  the development of eu plan proteins and it is the members decision  to activate those tools or not   among those tools you find  a coupled income support   for protein cramps where you have a special  mechanism with a an add-up a sorry a top-up   by two twelve person so you could go from  uh uh 13 to 15 percent of direct payment   as you know uh denmark and sweden  decided not to support a couple income   structure support or protein crops through  income support but at eu level there is a 50   increase of the concern area and 26  percent increase of financial support   um as a second tool we could also mention the new  tool which is which are operational programs in   other sectors what you call other sectors  in the past you had the possibility to   subsidy investment and some interventions uh  done by produce organization in in a fruit   and vegetable sector but also in in a smaller  scale in a leaf sector and hub sector now this   possibility is open to all the sectors this  is new completely new um and it allows you   know action indeed in investment but also crisis  prevention you know support and risk management   and we firmly believe that it could be  useful for protein crops in particular   by making stronger the value chain which is  a recognized weakness of protein crop sector   but it lasts only friends or i mean it's already  good but only friends decided to activate it and   the other member states did not activate it for  protein crops and they will activate it by 2024   uh and the budget is not yet clearly defined in  the initial you know uh captured planet dimension   33 33 million euro per year for those programs  but we'll see uh very soon i guess next year   they will have to to modify the capacity plan to  make it more precise and then another tool which   is new are the eco schemes and uh deco schemes  uh will certainly reward practices uh uh where   you could find legumes which are favorable as you  know for uh the the environment and then of course   uh the the actions and interventions and the royal  development remains and is still an important tool um a second follow-up actions would concern  a market analysis transparencies there were   several actions in particular in since 2021 we  we collect prices concerning some protein crops   and all seeds and uh that gives us you know a  better understanding of the market and we'll   of course we publish them uh on the agree dj  agree portal and also uh we worked together with   europe stats on the new regulation which is  called the c c i c a i o regulation you know   that that uh reform uh the um the statistics  collection in the eu concerning agriculture   and there will have new information on the  human consumption of of uh protein crops um   uh on or so feed and beer biotin all you know  and in particular of will receive more detailed   information on a more regular pace on grassland  and grazing that's quite important and this uh s   aio regulation um is nearly adopted it  should be adopted in uh early october   uh or early autumn at least um and then there is  another tool that has been developed uh in the   framework of those transparency uh actions that's  uh the eu feed program balance sheet you see it   here and you find the link below i know i hope  that some of you know it it's a tool where we list   uh all the protein sources in the feed we give  some market and balance sheet information on the   those products you know for all the detailed  products here you just have the main lines but   in fact you have all the details when you you go  into the the the sheet and you will see for all   the products all the cereals you know wheat all  the oil seeds so yeah different form of soya you   see all what is here produced in the eu imported  exported but then what is interesting what is   used for the feed and there is a coefficient  a conversion coefficient to to calculate the   crude protein content and volume for all those  feed and eventually we have a total figure um that gives us the total volume of proteins  which is used by a livestock in europe for   the moment as you see it it's uh 73 million tons  of crude protein of which 56 are coming from the   eu and i recommend you to have a look at  this tool it's quite quite interesting   and of course the development of  sustainable food system will only take place   if all actors invest in research and innovation  only in the first hours in europe work program   2021 three research program innovation directly  concerning you know protein crops uh are planned   for total amount of 23 million euro yesterday i  attended to a kickoff meeting of the first program   which is called uh valpo path and that's  just started yesterday and it's to tell   me your 10 million euro programs they have a  website i recommend you to have a look at it   um and as actions also it's a promotion  of the benefits of of plant proteins   that's a simple way to reduce dependency  on imported plant-based protein   to um but reducing also it wouldn't would would  mean also perhaps a reduction of the livestock but   the resolution of the livestock is not a simple  solution uh and it will not be efficient as such   because we need to mention also to reduce um to  change the consumer diet if you do not change the   consumer diet towards a more a plant-based diet  then we'll end up by importing uh more you know   livestock from third countries and it will not uh  help for the the environment it would not help you   know for uh uh uh uh iuw agriculture as such  so really the first thing as it is recommended   in the farm to fork strategy is to accompany the  consumer to change its diet to a more plant-based   diet with less red and processed meat and with  more uh food vegetable and and pulses this is   why also uh we the commission announced in the uh  in the farm to focus strategy that it will review   its policy on the promotion and we are in the  process of doing it it's not yet you know the   commission hasn't yet published you know uh  the uh its proposal in this regard but i can   tell you that we we have the intention but  it should still be clear to tackle a problem   uh uh under the current legislation that  where where we finance you know some um sorry the the promotion activities uh of a  great actual products are not targeting all   the the products which are plant-based there  are some restrictions and we'll go over that   furthermore when we when we promote pulses for  human consumption currently we mostly promote   imported pulses because 40 percent of the  chickpeas are imported sixty per person   the lentils are imported for instance so  that we will have also to tackle you know   and then knowledge exchange uh there's been a  couple you know of activity organized by the   commission and there will be some more activity  organized by the commission in the future   on on the exchange of information on protein crops   now let's have a very quick look  because i just have three more minutes   on the initiatives of different member states  just to mention that some member states had a   strategy a strategy for developing the protein  crops and they've published them i here mentioned   france netherlands belgium but but then there is  also of course the danish one that was published   in 2018 and also the german one there was also uh  the initiative you know france for instance in in   ireland on the climate change to where there  were specific actions for the development of   of protein crops and pulses and also i would like  to mention uh an um an opinion that is prepared   for the moment by the economic and european  economic and social committee um which is uh an   opinion towards a sustainable plan pertains and  planned all strategy for the eu i think it has   it has some interesting and courageous you know  recommendation and it should be published in   october and i recommend you to to to have a  look at it when it will be published in uh   in october and last um we have also other  ongoing initiatives at the eu level uh the   first one would be the review of the 2018 report  the report where for which i detailed the actions   and the commemoration took the uh the decision  uh to revise this report he took this decision   in the food security uh communication published in  in march and but uh it's not yet clear or not yet   defined uh and and we cannot yet talk about the  form the report will take the timing and the scope   in any case there is uh many stakeholders  when to broaden the scope compared to the   2018 report it was really focusing on a high sorry  rich plant rich protein plan so those plants with   more than 15 percent proteins and now  this report will be extended certainly to   all the sources that uh you could find in  the uh in the protein feed balance sheet   that's just showed you there were there  was also i just mentioned that the the pap   revision of the rules that was adopted last  year and also the legislation on legislation   and feed additives and then uh last but not least  we started in june a study here in the commission   to further identify the opportunities and  limitations for diversifying feed sources   and of course with a particular regard to  protein feeds and this study should deliver   its first results end of 2023 thank you very  much and i guess we'll now give the flow to the   next speaker and process the question later later  on if i well understood thank you very much lauren   i was a bit worried when you had many points left  halfway through your presentation but you did   excellently in completing on time and we did  understand the european uh commission focus   on increased utilization of plant protein in an  efficient way to improve the efficiency of the   land use to food system of europe now the um next  speaker is also from the european commission it's   uh galin genshev from dj energy i will hand  over the screen and the loudspeakers to you   okay um so um i'll start basically um uh by  uh framing very quickly the policy context   also the the different tools what we have  at a strategic level and a more legal level   in supporting the biogas biomethane in terms  of assessing it its footprint certifying   traceability etc in order to make uh possible  the production and consumption of of these gases   and in the second part i'll focus more briefly  but more concretely on the ripalo eu action plan   from from may this year which targets uh directly  by emitting production with the aim to achieve a   very ambitious but realistic target of 35 billion  cubic meters biometer production annual production   by 2030. um very quickly with the policy conflicts  as you know everything started with the green deal   uh whose ambition and aim was to make it possible  to put all the preconditions in order to um ensure   that the framework of being carbon neutral by  2050 it mainly um uh entailed uh raising the   different targets in the different sectors  as well as reforming the system as such   in order to achieve efficiencies and support  uh the implementation of the of the vision for   the future of the energy system which is a system  uh um primarily based on energy efficiency first   principle on circularity on uh smart grids  and in interactions between the different   um the different uh energy systems um making  it possible uh to achieve synergies in this way   uh also on production and on uh cutting uh demand  optimizing the demand and the second pillar   uh obviously uh deep deep electrification as main  tool of the carbonization but very importantly   annoying the fact that full electrification  would be either not possible or very costly   specifically in some areas in the heart to the  carbonized sectors also remote geographical   areas like rural areas for example some of  the rural areas and this opened the room for   renewable and low carbon fuels in the energy  mix of the future and respectively of gaseous uh   sustainable gaseous fuels and this was also  supported by the projections for 2050 consumption   which show that um and expect 20 percent  of gaseous fuels uh uh to be to be also um   uh consumed in 2050 and basically this um put  uh automatically the objective of how to switch   from fossil based to renewable and low carbon uh  gaseous fuels uh where the expectation obviously   is that the the future mix will be mainly based  on biogas biomethane as well as um renewable low   carbon hydrogen as well as uh synthetic synthetic  methane this vision of the future was supported   by the the main strategic documents very briefly  on the the uni uh two i'll just mentioned two of   the strategic documents the unit in strategy  in the energy system integration strategy   as you know the meeting the new meeting strategy  was about cutting emitting leakages and emissions   from from the from the system um but it contained  a very important uh area on agriculture since   half of the other meeting emissions are coming  from agriculture and mainly uh um identified a   biogas production as a key mitigation to  the mainstream of the vegas production   based on on waste and residues from agriculture as  a main mitigation tool of cutting emissions as a   way of modern waste management transforming  basically a burden into an opportunity the   energy system integration supported this strategic  vision clearly promoting waste and residue-based   production of sustainable gases uh and in this  in this uh strategic framework the renewable   energy directive obviously plays a key role uh  the the threat to the red two version is from from   december 2018 and already there there are clear  clear supporting um tools uh for uh uh for for the   for the the certain so the the the uh promotion of  the of the biogas uh in waste-based biogas and and   respectively operating into biomethane through  several tools all they quickly just mentioned   the main tool is basically the methodology the  way how the emissions are calculated which is   a part of the sustainability criteria um they are  basically inbuilt um bonuses for waste-based uh   production paths which will make them if they if  they respect all the sustainability criteria will   make them either carbon neutral or if digestate  or manure is used into carbon negative using the   bonus the definition just something also probably  important the definition of food feed crops   basically considers intermediary and cover crops  as not main crops which basically makes them an   additional uh stream for generating biomass  which is not cupped uh as you know there is a   cup for the first generation uh biogas by fuels uh  liquid transport uh to a maximum of seven percent   uh but since these intermediary cover crops are  not considered main crops this the this kind   of debate food feed against energy is avoided  this way since there is no additional land uh   use of additional land trigger then this is  considered as sustainable by additional biomass   and this may trigger let's see an additional also  production of of biogas uh unimportant also it   just proposed um uh of the uh update of the anna  x9 as you know this is an option on underrates2   where new feedstocks uh uh could be uh let's say  proposed uh and this also has an opportunity for   advanced advanced biofuels but also for advanced  biogas um as i mentioned uh just for what what in   more in terms this bonus means a 45 grams uh co2  equivalent per megajoule if manure is is is used basically um an important work stream which is  ongoing right now with the support of the joint   research center we are reviewing the annexes  five and six and they are also there is part   of the work will support the biogas production uh  specifically by introducing more uh def several   disaggregated values which will help the the  better uh calculation of emissions specifically   on the manual also some uh the default is this  related default values for feedstocks which   will help economic operators to to better valorize  uh what what they are doing an important pillar of   our uh promotion system i would say is the  certification since without certification a   biogas or biomethane cannot be called sustainable  and respectively consumed so in we recently um   validated the 13 voluntary schemes uh i recognized  that involuntary schemes for certification of   fuels in principle and some of them as mentioned  on the slide have heaven scope also biogas   biomethane certification uh we were also planning  to upgrade the biograde calculation tool which   will make it possible uh for economic operators  to actually easily calculate uh or online   their missions and this would help specifically  i would say smaller smaller producers   uh a very important aspect as well in our system  current system we are working on uh it's under   article 28 of the renewable energy directive there  is this obligation to set up a union database uh   tracing tracing transport fuels uh renewable  transport fuels it will probably uh if our   proposal is accepted it will cover all end users  in the end so the let's go fully updated we are   planning to put online this database is a huge  work in a complex system uh tracing basically the   the fuels as of january next year uh and this  basically would make it possible to trace the   uh the megawatt of biomethane uh in such a  way allowing the the the cross-border trade   since the system will the the the digital system  will cover the integrated european grid as one   mass balancing system very importantly i have no  time to enter into details but very importantly   since also biometers is probably about uh  as an average one percent of the whole gas   uh in in the pipes so it's not about tracing  molecules but it's more accounting the injected   sustainable capacity in the consume sustainable  capacity through basically a mass balancing system   this would allow also cross-border trade among  the member states and would uh will in this way   promote the the production and respectively  um make possible the consumption uh of   biogas and by meeting in this case uh we're  also planning to basically uh connect this   this uh in kabul with this digital system also  neighboring countries specifically uh uh once the   the situation we hope would allow uh to basically  connect also ukraine as it's considered as   one of the let's say neighboring countries  with a higher untapped potential about 20   billion cubic meters of of um of biomethane  this is a potential that is untapped and could   help basically um the the energy  independence as of the you as far as um sustainable gases are concerned and so now  and concretely on the republic action plan   uh basically uh the the the framework i just uh  briefly um described was there before uh the the   the the addition of russia on ukraine and the  drastically uh worsening geopolitical situation   so basically uh in the case of biomethane i would  say uh displayed a catalytic role uh making the   the need the even even higher and the pressing  need uh for being more independent from russia and   uh basically um uh cutting uh progressively down  to zero the i think about 165 billion cubic meters   of of of natural gas imported at at the beginning  from russia so the as you know the um uh the the   uh the the republican planned plan biomedian was  announced um as as part of the of communication   and in the package uh with the with the uh  ambitious target of uh going up to 35 billion   billion meters from 18 already uh envisaged so uh  it's it's another uh 70 17 sorry uh billion cubic   meters per year uh to be achieved by 2030. um the  plan basically tries to this is a let's say an   ambitious but realistic target as well uh and in  order to be able to achieve it then there are many   aspects that needs to be tackled on the on  the not only on the production but also on the   on promotion uh also on financing on permitting et  cetera that's why this plan is very comprehensive   uh and um i'll i will not have the time to  go into details but we'll see very quickly um   basically um the the the core the core  objective is um uh to prop to further   promote biogas mainstream that potential  mainly on waste-based residue-based uh   uh paths uh this is expected to be and  specifically waste residue based from agriculture   as a main entire potential to basically there  are member states with where this potential is   quite well developed so to to go to the let's say  to the maximum uh sustained possible sustainable   uh volume but there are other member states uh  where there's a huge potential which is untapped   so there are not so many projects and that's  why this is basically the the main objective is   optimize the production of biogas and uh put  incentives for its upgrading into biomethane um   obviously as well on on on direct biomethane  production through gasification but   in any case it's it's expected to be a minor  minor source a rough estimate of 35 billion   euros investment needs um so um as i  said no time for going into details but   um just there are five pillars in reality  in the plan the first is quite important   this is the strategic pillar uh where  the uh the the main the key actions also   linked to the uh to green biorefineries to  rural areas and agricultural producers uh linked and basically there are three three main  streams i would mention first of all the biometer   industrial partnership this is a partnership of  the industry the whole value chain organized by   the european biogas association but also um this  is open to any key stakeholders or interested   parties academia ngos and this by me the  industrial partnership we are about to finalize   the preparation of the european biogas association  it will be officially launched a part of the   sustainable energy week co poco jacob on the on  the agricultural side is active layered there   as well as uh on the commission site dj  agri and dg energy will be represented at   the director's level in the governing board  together with industry uh and other other also   member states representatives um so this basically  this partnership will cover through task forces   all the rest of the plan and will try to support  through data best practices um best scenarios for   production uh and also business models uh  uh will support all the other part of the   of the plan and very importantly very specifically  will support the member states as one of the key   task forces will be on developing manuals for uh  for developing national strategies of sustainable   biogas and bahrain in production um link to what i  just said that there are some member states where   the untapped potential is huge so focusing on  those members states obviously where um there   are no strategies there they also um with the  idea that either to develop standalone or to have   a dimension of this of this um energy strategy  into the the national energy and climate plans   in the in the ongoing update uh another  important pillar of this of this uh   story another important stream in this  pillar is obviously also the support   to promote uh multi-stakeholder engagement  uh as you know specifically for the remote   areas for rural areas very often that  this this these projects it's about um   involving a multi-stakeholder engagement  which is a precondition for that project   meaning local governments meaning farmers meaning  let's say um small businesses uh also ngos to to   increase the acceptance of such projects therefore  this is key that good practices are basically   streamlined there and the role uh just last thing  the role of farmers and their organizations is key   there are many actually agricultural cooperatives  developing such projects so the idea as i said at   the beginning is basically mainstreaming what  is this in order to actually attain the full   uh uh sustainable potential for biomethane  for biogas and biomethane very quickly as i   said the plan would cover different different  aspects in a comprehensive way reducing the   the red tape and speeding permitting is key in  order to to actually allow for quicker development   potential um the corporation neighborly  countries as i mentioned ukraine will be a key   key partner there there's some preparatory work on  the certification including ukraine in the future   in the traceability system as well as lifting some  regulatory barriers in the legislation so this is   an ongoing work which we have started  through a memorandum of understanding with   ukraine and this i hope this will further  materialize one day also two concrete projects um   another another important uh appeal of the  providing incentive for biblegas upgrading   since basically today we have only  three billion cubic meters of biomethane   majority basically being biogas so the idea  is that we uh in parallel increase the the   the production of biogas but also the upgrading  so changing in some cases this would mean uh   revising member states support schemes in order  to focus on upgrading since this is biomethane   is the most efficient uh let's say energy use  compared to biogas but an important obviously in a connection or injection option then this  this basically makes up a project non non   non workable so that that's uh why  um there will be um an effort to uh   make this assessment and there will be a task  force also in the in the industrial partnership   supporting this that in at every member  states regional authorities together with the   with the uh distribution uh um network  operators and uh transmission network   operators they do an assessment of the areas  where the potential lies for biogas by meeting   based on the existing feedstocks or waste or  or existing projects or plans for projects   and to see what the connection capacity is and  basically to adjust the system into the future   in order to support this and very importantly  a huge increase sudden increase we hope a   via meeting and its injection may basically  technically uh be impossible if for example the   system is not prepared uh to tackle with with the  increase uh which also in some cases means reverse   flow uh uh in order to basically regulate  the the the the pipes uh this also means uh   um quality standards for the gas to to basically  make it possible to for example to crossbow the   transfer of the of the biomethane uh with this  is specifically about the oxygen content so all   these all these bottlenecks to be to be tackled  uh to to have a cost efficient deployment of the   of the biomethane uh also this there is a lot on  on the horizon 2020 horizon europe on on different   aspects on the small scale also but the focus will  continue identifying the gaps there will be a task   force in the stock partnership as well in order to  focus the the future research specifically on the   increasing the the the uh the efficiency of the  small scale technologies also focusing on on new   paths a bit mainstreaming and further improving  let's say the use of of uh of gasification of   woody biomass for example based on residues and  waste from from from wood sorry i'm finished i'm   finished sorry for it it's a lot um i'm finished  and the last the last pillar is about financing   uh where also uh we'll be involved in the europe  investment bank basically a mixture from subsidies   the the the common agriculture boys through the  real development is a key uh let's say support   together with some some some uh financial  instruments thank you sorry for being alone inside of the european union regarding the  multi-top that may be reached by efficient   biogas production the rural development the  energy independence and the greenhouse gas   reductions that are possible and the ambitions  are high and have been accelerated by the crisis   after putin's invasion in in the ukraine but we  also see the issues of sustainability criteria   tracing demands and so on which may also provide  obstacles to the development we're now going   to enter into the uh more technical and more  nordic perspective on these issues and the first   speaker is martin jan jensen from department of  biological and chemical engineering at oregon's   university thank you thank you very much and  good morning everyone um so i will quickly run   through focus in in on the green biorefinery  technology the green biorefinery system   a quick fly in on on what is it actually the  technology is and and can do and the status   at the moment um before we give the  word uh further to to colleagues um yeah   so um well the the green buyer refinery is  based on on the well-known concept of green leaf   protein extraction where you have a green leaf  a grass or clover you have a wet fractionation   to a press cake fiber and you have a green juice  and then you separate out the protein from the   green juice and get a protein concentrate and a  residual juice this fairly simple aberration is is affected by a lot of parameters  of the plant and the processing   and we have been working on this for for quite  some years in denmark and also in collaboration   with sweden for the last four years in the green  valleys project and i'm from the engineering side   working with the upscaling from lab to now demo  scale that we have been running a demo facility in   oaks university for the last three years 10 tons  an hour maximum capacity of input of wet grass so our approach has been to develop  this fairly well-known technology   in in the sense that the focus  on simplicity practicality   and bulk applications to get it work in  to work in agriculture and setting up this   grass by refinery that produces a protein  concentrate for monogastric animals pigs and   and poultry a fiber for ruminant animals or  biogas if you don't have any cows and a residual   liquid that goes very well in biogas and you can  recycle the nutrients back to the field so that's   the concept and the drivers are environmental  um in in for environmental reasons in in the   agriculture for technology development reasons  in the industry and for sustainability issues in   the feed application and a status in in this green  biorefining technology in in denmark where we are   probably in the forefront of this concept of green  biorefinery um we've been working hard to get   the quality of the protein concentrate uh good  enough so we can substitute soy this is uh now we we've seen that several times in feed trials  that we perfectly fine can substitute uh the soy   with the protein concentrate coming from grasses  and clovers the fiber press cake for biogas and   for rumen and animal feed is also okay it's  fairly easy to produce a biogas from from this   fiber fraction and the press cake works well  as a ruminant feed depending on the incoming   raw material of course it will make changes um the  commercialization is ongoing in denmark there are   two facilities in denmark that have been  established commercial facilities and   within the last two years they are running in the technology working with it  improving it it's still difficult or a challenge   to to have a really good positive business case so  this is a focus area and the reason for for uh for   the not not instantly good business cases that the  the yields of the protein concentrate can change a   lot depending on the raw material the processing  and it's often too low and we are working hard   both in oaks university and in with the industry  to improve these yields and then there's a great   potential in in the the three process streams  of protein fiber and this residual juice that   we call brown juice in increasing the value of  of those thereby increasing the business case   so the next three slides uh i will just quickly  talk about what what we see as the the possible increases in in the different process  streams so if we take the protein   part first it's now a protein concentrate  for substituting normal soy milk   but making specialty feed with extra high protein  and optimize amino acid composition through   processing or breeding of the raw material get a  value out of the lipid content etc or as we also   are working on uh change into to food protein  so bypass the the monogastric animals and go to   the monogastric human beings um this however uh  require more process development and also for for   the food a novel food approval in the eu which  is very important otherwise there is no market   however having high value products is good  and it helps the business case but having   low value bulk products really is important  for cashing in on the sustainability aspects   for the fiber which is now ruminant animal feed or  substrate for biomethane we could think of thermal   conversion paralysis biochar lignocellulosic  biorefinery making biochemicals biomaterials   there are works on insulation materials of grass  textile materials of the cellulose fiber etc   and so there are good possibilities in the fiber  fraction which is 70 percent of the dry matter   coming in and then the residual juice which is  now for for biogas using membrane technology   of concentrating the valuable compounds for  fermentation precision fermentation substrate   or taking out already available valuable  compounds in this liquid residue so so these   are what we see as the main value increasing  uh technologies for the green bar finally   thank you very much an illustration of how we in  the nordic countries are actually doing things   also and um crystal i'll hand over to you to um  continue describing some of the other practical   attempts to make these  biorefineries real and profitable thank you um okay uh now going to the biomass that  goes into this by refinery which is grass grass   clover or actually it could be pure leguminous and  the thing about this is that i have just started   here to say something about crop rotations because  this is basic when we talk about agriculture   and this is some kind of an engine for when we're  producing the biomass and this slide shows what's   quite typical in european agricultural areas  we have only annual crops and it's dominated   by cereals and you have also winter rapeseed here  and the possibilities here to have this integrated   in the farming land is actually to change crop  rotation and get into two three maybe four years   of grass clubbers you get the perennial crop and  then you go back and have an annual crops you have   a higher diversity in your in your agriculture  and this actually has many many positive economic   gains it's very obvious and for example soil  properties weed biodiversity and we could talk   a lot about this but it also actually ends up in  higher yields having wheat after wheat compared   to having wheat after break crop can actually have  a yield increase of around 20 percent so actually   today we are having slightly two years small  yields because we have two uh bad crop rotations   here is an example of of the biodiversity  and pesticide effects if we have these   two non-diverse crop rotation we have for example  increasing problem with resistant weeds and also   pests like fungus because we actually have a bit  too much cereals in the crop rotation here is one   example and this might lead to high yield cuts  actually it's already doing this in some wheat   growing areas in europe and if we look at the  landscape scale you can see here a picture from   colleagues in france actually but it could also be  in in other parts of europe or in southern sweden   we have very few crop species and this  is bad for biodiversity we know that   increasing biodiversity will increase  uh the biodiversity in in the landscape another important of growing this grass clubber is  that it's perennial and this is a i have learned   from my danish friends which is very good but  showing just when you have perennial grass we   take three or four cuts per year but you always  have it green and especially during winter time   you don't break it up as you do when you have  this traditional annual crops where you have no   or very little plants in the winter which  is very good for neutral itching and erosion   but i end up and just say a few things about  very important and that is the potential for   carbon removals that is to increase soil  organic carbon by growing more perennials   and i will show you some examples from swedish  field trials here where we actually have   looked at for 35 years followed where we had a  traditional only cereal and then change into a   grass clever rotation where we had three  years of gross clubber and one year of cereal   and it was actually followed for for um 35 years  and in average we had quite six especially in   the squander sites is quite high soil carbon  increase and it means that with this change we   actually for 35 years we are actually taking co2  from the atmosphere and storing it in the in the   soil and to be able to do this significantly  in agriculture we have to grow more perennials   this is a quite big thing talking about how we  can have more carbon removals but carbon farming   is talked in this green deal and i think it's very  important now what we are going to work further on   but there are challenging thing here for one thing  is that we have too few field experiments to back   up we use modeling and the model give different  results and there is a very big variation between   different sites which is which is how it  is can have to do with cultivation history   and you can look here for example exactly the same  experiment and you had more than double higher   salt carbon increase in average in this corner  site compared with this westerothalan site   just to finish off if we think about introducing  this grass by refinery together with biogas   that would be very interesting for example in this  very serial dominated landscape and there are many   of those in europe and and they have problems  actually and we have just tried to understand   what could happen in an in a in a landscape like  this we took schoner where we today have a biogas   in you would buy a we have data from our field  experiments and we have started now and do quite   a lot of calculation what will actually happen if  we would integrate more gross clubber crops there   and jordan will continue with this afterwards  discussion but there are many things that are   actually happening with the greenhouse  gases when you do this system change   so you have here um more than screen by refinery  here we have a lot of farmers with potential   to change some of the crop rotation that is con  change some cereals to gross clubber and deliver   biomass input for this green biorefinery what will  happen is that at the farm we will have reduced   greenhouse gases because of less use of fertilizer  and we have soil carbon increase and then we will   have protein that can substitute soy meal  we will produce biomethane and we will have   very important actually bio fertilizer from the  biogas which will support uh substitute imported   uh fertilizers so there are many benefits actually  when you look at the overall system so i will   finish here now and here i will talk a bit more  about these carbon removals and benefits thank you   thank you crystal uh i think that what we now  heard during these two presentations was first   how interesting it is to study the opportunities  of producing multiple products from a single   feedstock and then we heard how complicated it  can be to actually produce the feedstock because   crop rotation is one important factor deciding  what will be long-term efficient or even long-term   sustainable in the production of the biomass and  you can understand the challenges of the european   commission and and other european institutions  trying to formulate sustainability criteria   and how easy it is to confuse the discussion  uh i will now hand over to your ambanders   to talk more about uh the perspectives and  experiences from sweden and sweden in your case   i assume the floor is yours thank you tomas so we  are following on first from from where crystal uh   ended here and it's as an illustration of of what  you could achieve in terms of mitigation from from   one hectare here with this transition that that  crystal described so you will see you go from   the serial dominated landscape to the rotation  with more of glass globally and you can further   by refinery production then produce roughly  from one hectare 1.6 ton dimetrogreen protein   and roughly 600 cubic meters of biomethane  and the greenhouse gas savings here including   then also carbon removals since we build  carbon in soils and possibly in biomaterials   you would be on this is a ballpark number it  depends much on how you use the products and what   to displace but just to give you a sense from  what we on what you could deliver here i also   wanted to show you pictures of the heroic modelers  that derive all the numbers that we talked about   so so the subname is here today andreas is not  here i think he's probably busy with modeling uh when we talk about danish swedish perspectives  i think as you will see also the strategies for   green by refinery development will  look different in different countries   scenes conditions are also different and not only  natural conditions but basically the the structure   of forest and our cultural industries and also in  general energy infrastructure and not the least   political goals what you see here is actually  a global picture from from the ipcc 1.5 report  

just showing or in in principle what most  countries need to achieve in moving towards   ambitious climate targets where you need to phase  out fossil fuel use of course but also change   land use and in many places probably  aiming from converting land use   activities from a source of emissions  into a sink for carbon which is then   something you can be more or less successful  depending on where you are in the world then if if you look at approaches to try to do  the transition and how that has been you could   say interrupted or or through now a difficult  time due to the ukraine war and the energy crisis   uh you could see unfortunate uh distraction  in some areas from the strive to reduce   emissions but hopefully what you will see with  this red curve here it will eventually turn   right right up and improve both and the security  and the greenhouse gas performance over time so so   let's hope that we are now in a phase where we are  just learning how to do this better than we are   doing currently and here greenblind refineries  i think can can be an important part of that   then i want to just to spend a couple of slides  explaining my question mark here for the swedish   perspective how how green by refineries will  evolve i think we can say for certain that that   we will play towards both the transport sector  but also the the industrial sector and materials   production and also heat and power so so  bio-based materials and and bio-based energy   will be important in in most sectors in sweden  and and we have also recognized that there is   uh almost a competition for for really having  the privilege to use the biomass feedstock for   europe your own in your own sector that's part of  the swedish debate at least where to use biomass when we think about green by refineries and  and where we see a place for it we need also   to keep an eye on other developments  and just to illustrate that this is   another group chalmers working with thermo  chemical conversion and supporting the   transition in in the petrochemical industry where  you also need to move away from fossil fuel based   systems and where you probably if you implement  this in a wise way can actually gradually close   the carbon material cycles while shifting from  fossil carbon to green carbon to become much more   climate friendly but also resource efficient and  of course this is this is a huge development that   green by refining development needs to to relate  to to find its own niche in in sweden here the other example and and diagram that crystal  told me to to rip out of the presentation because   no one will understand it anyway and i said it  it's not a problem just read what beyond sandy   and say and you will understand also the diagram  here it's it's illustrating how carbon-based   alternatives to scarce metals are becoming  more and more important in in development   and you can see new carbon-based materials  like this that probably will lead to what   you would call bio-based applications in in new  places you wouldn't expect just a few years back and just to give a few examples here on on  the future by energy systems or if you would   like to call it bio-based energy systems you  might see electro fuels that are produced from   renewable electricity and probably by generic  co2 that has been captured from chp plants   and then you would start thinking what is really  bioenergy and what is really bio-based and   and you see you have many other examples  where bio-based systems can actually be part   of renewable energy systems but not the type of  our energy that we have traditionally looked at i think a few things just to  to round off here what what i   think we can be certain about and we  have discussed it quite much in the   in the green valleys project that is that we we as  morten also said we need to to really figure out   what to do with all the the resources that we  bring into the green bar refineries and how we can   develop products and not the least products  that really preserve the properties of the   biomass because that's probably where  we can have a competitive edge against   other carbon-based materials and we have  thought about textiles as one possibly important   application in the continuation carbon storage  in soils and ecosystems as crystal talked about   we need to consider that as a long-term commitment  in land use because the carbon will stay in the   soil as long as we manage the soil wisely on the  longer term if we change land use again we might   lose the carbon so we need to develop system with  lando systems that deliver products that we want   in the long term and here we believe at least that  the type of rotation changes that we have looked   at in this project they are they are examples  of a really promising sustainable lando systems so thomas i can finish here or i can show three  slides on how we can save the world from all evil   it's up to you actually i give you  the three slides without doubt okay uh just to illustrate just to illustrate now going  to the european level and showing how you could   approach and explore the possibilities for for  grass-based rotations or also other ligands   lossy crops what we have done in a few years now  in studies that is that we have investigated we   have targeted problems of current agriculture  land use and investigated how you could expand   alternative land your systems such as the  grass-based systems to address the environmental   problems we have looked at soil carbon losses  which has been going on for quite a long time   nitrogen emissions to water soil caused by water  and wind and also problems related to recurring   floods so these are examples of challenges that  we face in europe where land use change might   actually provide mitigation solution and then  we have calculated how much biomass and thereby   bio-based products that that you could produce  if you implement that on a large scale and   and here just of course many different products  but just connecting them to the repower eu targets   and again this is a ballpark number now the biogas  that you could get from a large scale deployment   here of grass cleverlay it's it's roughly the  same total volume as you actually have as a   target for biomethane europe not saying that this  is a silver bullet that will deliver uh all gas   needed but just to illustrate that it's big enough  to be taken seriously and looked at more carefully   okay so not all evil avoided we'll see what you're  saying is that the soil effect is the same as the   fossil gas replacement effect is it so so  this is by this is the biogas production   from the grass that you produce while you  also reverse the soil loss process so that   would be an additional climate benefit  besides displacing russian fossil gas yes yes new importer soil and all the rest of the  evil in the world as i said okay thank you thank   you joran wonderful illustration of the further  opportunities also in the technology sector where   carbon-based materials may play a very important  role in replacing what is today metals sometimes   scarce metals used okay fury and insane the  floor is yours thank you i think i'm on yes   i will scale down from the european level to  a small living lab called denmark um and as   you can see danish agriculture has developed  a lot we think um but which one that's the one actually our agriculture  is highly contested we have   a total land cover of agriculture of 62 percent of  the total area of the country 80 of that land is   on in aerial corps which are the bad ones we  have a long coastal line with shallow fjords   and we have to tackle the eu water framework  directive eu and national climate policies   groundwater protection for the drinking water  and we have poured that biodiversity and finally   this agriculture is not really resource  efficient which might be the only thing that   might be surprising because the other things are  quite well known you think this is really very   resource efficient with such a big house  and a very efficient wheat field but look   at it it's not green it's in the middle of the  summer where we should have photosynthesis and   that's something i want to stress again most  of you have probably heard me saying it before   but i cannot say too often that photosynthesis  photosynthesis photosynthesis is what we live from   and what we will have to  live from in in the future   uh because this is the most cost efficient  cost-effective and scalable process   to capture carbon and to deliver food energy  materials and negative emissions if anybody   disagree with me i would like to know if  i'm wrong but i still think this is correct and those technologies that we've seen  in the morning and with this focus on   increasing photosynthesis from that level  of losing almost half of the potential   production of an agricultural  landscape in denmark because the   agriculture has not been developed from a natural  point of view a natural science point of view   to carbon cap maximizing carbon capture but in  order to promote some specific products that was   valuable for the market and wars and things have  developed there the agriculture so now we could   think about developing it from a natural science  point of view and therefore we have been doing   some different scenarios of how danish agriculture  could develop into 2030 and 50 where we have some   goals to fulfill and we did business as usual just  doing more of what we have been doing for a while   they're using more and more of the manure  for biogas and the straw for different   energy purposes we've been combusting a lot of our  store but now we're using more and more of it for   for biogas and that we could do more but then we  have optimized in the biomass scenario a lot of   agricultural parameters like changing from  less effective crops into more effective   crops to increase the source the size of the  cake that we can share the total biomass also   we can choose some varieties of grain crops  that have more straw without compromising the   grain yield and there are many many small  things that we can do then we also because   this is maybe too much productivity we also  have an extensification scenario where we have   much more focus on nature as you saw we have very  little nature in denmark and there are some eu   regulations also to increase that so so this is  the focus of the third scenario and then we also   uh addressed the elephant in the room the  animal production which is starting to becoming   more and more debated in denmark whether we should  do something or not let the market rule or not   but at least it would be nice to see what  it means um this is just one slide to show   what could happen in a danish landscape if we  would try to fulfill the european water framework   directive by increasing the production of  grassland in the most nitrate sensitive areas then   the more dark the color the more annual crops  have to be changed into grasslands and you   see north of copenhagen everything has to be  changed into grassland because there's so little   um brain crops already so and there's a big  challenge to fulfill the water framework   uh directive in that area but otherwise it's  around the fjords in the western part of the   country that we have the main challenge and we  can do a lot by increasing uh grassland area   and then quick and dirty the the results from  a long um story on on our scenarios there as   you can see or i can tell you that today we are  producing primary products of that can be eaten   by animals or humans in danish agriculture of  something like 15 16 million tons of dry matter   then we use bio resources for energy and other  material purposes like two to three million tons   today then our scenario shows that we could you  produce and use another maybe 10 million tonnes   without compromising environment and climate i  haven't got the time to to go into those details   but that's something we also calculated um and  then there's a lot of variation uh between the   scenarios but you can see we could also take the  extensification scenario with much more nature   without losing the opportunity to still produce  much more biomass for for the buyer economy we have allowed an exchange on our  import export from with the scenarios um today we import a lot of soil as you can see  in the reference 2015-19 but on the other hand   we export some uh some grain that changes in  the different scenarios but but it also shows   that we could we could reduce that import  of soil significantly even in some scenarios   total

2022-09-26

Show video