Medrar coordinates the initiative, whose partners include Aresa, the USC and the Centro de Investigacións Agrarias de Mabegondo.

The European Union will finance with 7 million Euros the Nutritive project to valorize the slurry in Galician farms, promoted by the innovation consultancy Medrar Innovation Office from Lugo and in which another company from the province of Lugo, the Aresa Group, specialized in fertilizers, participates.

The consortium coordinated by Medrar that competed with this initiative to the R+D+i Horizon Europe program is integrated by 18 partners from several countries of the Old Continent, among them Portugal and Ireland, and other four from China. Among the requirements of the call for proposals is that the consortium that aspires to the grants must be made up of participants of different nationalities.

In addition to these two firms from Lugo, Galicia is represented in this ambitious project by the Centro de Investigacións Agrarias de Mabegondo (A Coruña), which depends on the Axencia Galega de Calidade Alimentaria (Agacal); the biotechnological company Zinpro from Compostela and the USC, through the Biogroup research group of the Escola Técnica Superior de Enxeñaría (Etse) and the Faculty of Chemistry.

The CEO and founder of Medrar, Hugo Criado, assures that slurry is «a waste to which we can give value», which is currently «managed as it was 20 years ago» and which is causing «a problem» in Galician regions such as A Limia (Ourense) or Deza (Pontevedra), for example.

This veterinarian from Vilalba stresses the importance of this European Union grant «not only for economic reasons, but also for its impact because in three years’ time we will be providing solutions to solve this problem».

«This R&D&I project includes 18 European partners and another four from China».

Hugo Criado explains that the idea is to «turn slurry into black gold» so that it provides «added value, so that the farmer gets paid and it is not an environmental problem».

This project, carried out by the PhDs in Chemical Engineering Leticia Regueiro and Lucia Argiz, specialized in environment, plans to model the typology of Galician farms because, according to Hugo Criado, «you can not apply the same standard to a SAT of A Pastoriza with 1,000 cows as an organic farm in A Ulloa of 50».

One of the possible uses that can be given to this waste generated by livestock farms, beyond as fertilizer, is for energy production in biogas plants.

La consultora de innovación Medrar, que echó a andar hace un lustro en Vilalba y que cuenta ahora también con sede en Lugo, ha dirigido en los últimos dos años más de una treintena de proyectos de I+D+i de empresas, incluido el de purín, que obtuvieron unos 20 millones de euros en total en ayudas de diferentes administraciones públicas.

Una planta de biogás que obtuvo financiación

Hace apenas un mes trascendía que otro proyecto con firmas lucenses, denominado Lugaz, que consiste en construir una planta de biogás para utilizar residuos lácteos, recibirá 4,5 millones de euros de la Unión Europea, con cargo a otro programa, para llevarlo a cabo en el plazo de dos años.

Esta iniciativa es íntegramente lucense, pues participan el Grupo Lence, Norvento, Agroamb y Medrar.

La planta que se ubicará en el polígono industrial de O Ceao supondrá una inversión de unos 7,5 millones de euros, de los que la ayuda europea supone el 60%.

Se prevé que la planta trate una media de unas 55.000 toneladas anuales de residuos, que procederían de las tres plantas lácteas de Leche Río y Leyma y de las 400 explotaciones ganaderas que son proveedoras de este grupo lucense.

Además se estima que esta planta permitirá reducir la emisión a la atmósfera de unas 37.300 toneladas de dióxido de carbono (CO²).

Original article: La UE concede 7 millones a un proyecto con empresas lucenses para valorizar purín (elprogreso.es) – ElProgreso, 10/01/2024.

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