Integrated water treatment, nutrient recovery and organic fertilizer production using dairy effluents

Livestock manure streams constitute a primary source of nutrients leading to watershed eutrophication, and nutrient mitigation is a major problem for the agricultural industry. Many dairies have anaerobic digesters (ADs) that reduce manure volumes and generate methane for energy. But the nutrients remaining in the wastewater are emitted to the environment after release from ADs. Midwestern BioAg (MBA), a producer and marketer of specialty fertilizers, has implemented a new facility to capture these nutrients and convert them to fertilizer. For our customers who farm organically, manure is an important nutrient source. Making an organic version of our new fertilizer could generate an important source of fertilizer, but we cannot make the current fertilizer organic because of a single synthetic component present in the process. This funding is to develop a new process, based on technology licensed from the USDA-ARS, which will use agricultural residues to create an organic version of the AD-derived fertilizer. Development of this organic fertilizer will provide many benefits. Cleaner water, reduced greenhouse gases, and fewer non-renewable resources used, as nutrients are removed from AD wastewater and recycled for crop production. A new source of organic fertilizer will support organic agriculture while providing an economic incentive for dairies to reduce air and water pollution. And construction of manufacturing facilities will bring good jobs to rural areas. MBA has the sales and marketing expertise, and distribution networks, to sell this fertilizer to organic farms across the Midwest and beyond, permitting rapid commercialization of the technology.?