The development of the Life+ RESAFE will determine positive environmental impacts. The main objective of the project is the demonstration of the use of an innovative fertilizer which will allow to reduce the use of mineral fertilizers in agriculture, since the nutrients required for fertilization will be obtained naturally from Urban Organic Waste (UOW), Farm Organic Residues (FOR) and bio-char through the employment of complex enzymatic mixtures. The use of each of these three components has a strong environmental added value:
• UOW is constantly produced by all human activities which makes it a quality and eco-friendly source of nutrients. Its use will allow to diverte waste from the landfills.
• FOR presents the same characteristics and its disposal, being complex and expensive, represents often a major issue for European farmers. Furthermore it is not possible in most cases to employ FOR “as it is”;
• Bio-char utilisation can reduce the global impact of farming: if used as a fertilizing
component, it improves water quality, increases soil fertility (e.g. soil chemical, biological, and physical properties improvements) and agricultural productivity; for these reasons, Bio-char significantly favours plant growth and improves the efficiency of nitrogen based fertilizers. Additionally, the bio-char enriched soils present better mechanical characteristics (e.g. pore and particle size), fertility and productivity, and can sustain agricultural production, whereas non-amended soils quickly become depleted of nutrients, forcing farmers to abandon the fields, leading to a continuous slash and burn cycle and the continuous loss of tropical rainforest. Furthermore, since the Bio-char is obtained by pyrolysis, it is also possible to produce bio-energy, generating this way an additional benefit without infrastructure changes. The Bio-char produced can be applied using the traditional tillage machineries or with the equipment used to apply fertilizers.
The main limiting factor to a larger use of organic fertilizers is often linked to an incorrect handling of the raw materials maturing process which leads to a poor agronomic quality of the final product. RESAFE will allow to improve the whole production chain, starting from the initial separate processing of UOW, FOR and Bio-char.
