The City Council of Ourense, the new associate partner of Ecoval Sudoe

The Ecoval Sudoe project continues to gain support! The City Council of Ourense joins today the associated partners’ list that supports the proposal, which pursues a paradigm shift in urban waste management, based on the recovery of organic waste and sewage sludge to obtain high added value bio-products.   

The support provided by the City Council of Ourense is essential to achieve the objectives pursued by Ecoval. The entity will facilitate the installation of pilot prototypes for the demonstration of technologies in the WWTP of Ourense and will collaborate in the supply of urban biowaste for the technological demonstrations carried out in the project.

In addition, the Council will also collaborate in public awareness campaigns on the correct separation of organic waste.

With the incorporation of the City Council of Ourense, Ecoval already has the support of 30 entities, from four countries and with competencies in different sectors. You can consult here all the entities that support the project’s commitment to the circular economy and environmental protection.

Hands in the mud! Ecoval Sudoe completes work on pilot plant for the production of volatile fatty acids

One of the objectives of the Ecoval Sudoe project is to demonstrate the technical feasibility of producing volatile fatty acids (VFA) from urban sludge. To do this, at the Ourense Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP), Cetaqua has set up different tests to optimise the generation of acids such as acetic, propionic, or butyric acid from sewage sludge.

In order to determine the most suitable operating conditions for the pilot VFA production plant, different laboratory-scale tests were first carried out, such as batch tests on a 0.5L scale and the operation of semi-continuous reactors of 5L volume, which demonstrated the suitability of sewage sludge as a substrate with high potential for the production of high added value bioproducts with VFA.

The information provided at the laboratory scale has helped Cetaqua technicians to have a first approximation of the VFA production yields that can be obtained from sludge with and without pre-treatment. They were also able to analyse the effect of operating parameters such as pH, feed/microorganism ratio, hydraulic residence time, etc.

On a pilot scale, the technicians have optimised the fermentation process for the production of VFA, obtaining a stream that has to undergo solid-liquid separation, a unitary operation that has had to be perfected thanks to “jar tests” that have made it possible to determine the optimum doses of coagulant and flocculant for the division of the solid and liquid fractions. Thus, the objective of producing a liquid current rich in VFA for the partner NEREUS to study its clarification and concentration and a high-dryness solid cake that INSA will recover energetically has been achieved.

Following these tests, work is now continuing on the pilot plant which, after a start-up phase marked by hydraulic difficulties in operation and the necessary adjustments, is now operating more robustly. It will soon begin to be fed with biowaste.

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Ecoval participates in the Innovation Days event in Galicia

In the framework of the Galicia Innovations Days event, which took place from 25th to 29th of October, the ECOVAL Sudoe project was presented in the session “The fourth decade of Interreg in Galicia”. This round table about the evolution, successes and opportunities of Interreg in Galicia took place on the first day of the event at 16h.

This session presented the history of Interreg (European Territorial Cooperation), milestones and success stories in Galicia.

The session speakers were: Dirk Peters, Senior Expert for European territorial cooperation, EGTC and ECBM (European Commission); María José Mariño, Director Area of Centres (Axencia Galega de Innovación); Xosé Lago, Poctep Coordinator at the Subdirección Xeral de Acción Exterior e de Cooperación Transfronteiriza (Xunta de Galicia); Nuria Rodriguez Aubo, Innovation and Technology Transfer at FEUGA (Galician Enterprise-University Foundation).

Representing FEUGA, Nuria Rodriguez Aubo, presented the work areas and the Interreg projects developed which FEUGA takes part. In reference to Ecoval SUDOE, the objectives, partners and functions that FEUGA develops in the project, which are dissemination, communication and technology transfer, were presented.

ECOVAL was also present in the exhibition area of the event, together with other Interreg projects, thus reinforcing networking and visibility.

 

Galicia Innovations Days  

The Galicia Innovations Days is an event organised by FEUGA, the Galician Ministry of Education (Xunta de Galicia) and the Galician University System, that brings together companies, researchers, universities, investors and consultants from different European countries and abroad.

12th Urban Intelligence and Sustainability Forum – GreenCities

Thanks to one of our associated partners, Aquona, Ecoval‘s name was present during the 12th Urban Intelligence and Sustainability Forum – GreenCities, on 29 September in Málaga.

This event brought together key opinion leaders in the field of urban management and the mobility of the future in the same space. During two days, the Palacio de Ferias y Congresos de Málaga was packed with ideas and case studies related to sustainability, innovation and circular economy, sharing knowledge, synergies and talent.

Laura de Vega Franco, Director of Sustainable Development at Aquona, participated in the round table organised by the Sustainable Development Department of the Government of Castilla-La Mancha, entitled “The 2030 Agenda from global to local, praxis in Circular Economy, Energy Transition and Digitalisation”. It was here that the ECOVAL project was presented and where it was ensured that “companies, in addition to sustainability, contribute to innovation and digitalisation of the commitment to the circular economy and to the promotion of the 2030 Agenda in the territory”.