Finding practical uses for livestock carcasses

May 30, 2018

New technology turns animal by-products and food waste into fertilizer and energy

By Kate Ayers
Staff Writer
Farms.com

An innovative technology has become a commercially viable method for converting livestock by-products into fertilizers and green energy.

The Lethbridge Biogas biorefining plant in Alberta recently completed the first successful commercial scale processing, a Biosphere Technologies Inc. release said on Tuesday.

“One of the big problems in the livestock industry is what has historically been done with waste, including inedibles, deadstock and organic waste,” Erick Schmidt, president of Biosphere Technologies Inc. and inventor of this technology, said to Farms.com yesterday.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has approved the new process for use on Specified Risk Materials (SRMs). The technology also destroys all infectious microbiological pathogens and prion diseases such as Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) in cattle and Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) in elk and deer, the release said.

The process is “now in the World Organisation for Animal Health’s Terrestrial Animal Health Code as approved for the destruction of any infectious agents, but we don’t destroy the nutrients,” Schmidt added. As a result, these nutrients can be returned to the soil as liquid or pelleted fertilizer.

This unique process uses high pressure and temperature steam reactors. Compared to rendering, incineration and landfilling, the new process provides an environmentally friendlier option for dealing with disease risk materials like carcasses.

“We don’t use any toxic chemicals. … Thermal hydrolysis uses water as our chemical,” Schmidt said.

“The water molecules react with all the fats and proteins in the meat and all the minerals. … And it breaks those down into smaller elements.”

The process denatures all the materials in three hours, turning waste products into a molasses-like consistency.

In addition, this breakthrough hydrolysis technology can turn animal by-products and food waste into biogas as a source of energy.

The technology is called the BIOTHYDRO process, invented by Schmidt. Biosphere Technologies Inc. and scientists and engineers in Alberta and Edinburgh also worked on the project over 20 years, the release said.

This process provides an alternative to synthetic fertilizers, which will be valuable for the organic agriculture, gardening and medical marijuana sectors.

The Lethbridge Biogas facility is in operation. The technology is also licenced for use in the BioRefinex Lacombe biorefinery project and Novigro Sciences Inc. in Edmonton, the release said.

Agricultural groups in Europe, the United States and China are also looking into implementing this technology.

The commercialization of the Biosphere technology offers health and environmental benefits – reducing global disease risks, water pollution and soil degradation, the release said.

Livestock producers may also see economic benefits as the disposal of SRMs is often expensive.

CNW Group/Biosphere Technologies Inc. photo

Video: US Soy: Pig growth is impaired by soybean meal displacement in the diet

Eric van Heugten, PhD, professor and swine extension specialist at North Carolina State University, recently spoke at the Iowa Swine Day Pre-Conference Symposium, titled Soybean Meal 360°: Expanding our horizons through discoveries and field-proven feeding strategies for improving pork production. The event was sponsored by Iowa State University and U.S. Soy.

Soybean meal offers pig producers a high-value proposition. It’s a high-quality protein source, providing essential and non-essential amino acids to the pig that are highly digestible and palatable. Studies now show that soybean meal provides higher net energy than current National Research Council (NRC) requirements. Plus, soybean meal offers health benefits such as isoflavones and antioxidants as well as benefits with respiratory diseases such as porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS).

One of several ingredients that compete with the inclusion of soybean meal in pig diets is dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS).

“With DDGS, we typically see more variable responses because of the quality differences depending on which plant it comes from,” said Dr. van Heugten. “At very high levels, we often see a reduction in performance especially with feed intake which can have negative consequences on pig performance, especially in the summer months when feed intake is already low and gaining weight is at a premium to get them to market.”

Over the last few decades, the industry has also seen the increased inclusion of crystalline amino acids in pig diets.

“We started with lysine at about 3 lbs. per ton in the diet, and then we added methionine and threonine to go to 6 to 8 lbs. per ton,” he said. “Now we have tryptophan, isoleucine and valine and can go to 12 to 15 lbs. per ton. All of these, when price competitive, are formulated into the diet and are displacing soybean meal which also removes the potential health benefits that soybean meal provides.”