On a field near Bingen on the Rhine, students of the Tech­nical Univer­sity of Bingen handed out around 300 kilo­grams of carbon ferti­lizer from chicken manure and pig manure over an area of 1,700 square metres. This ferti­lizer was produced as part of a joint rese­arch project by carbo­ni­zing the farm manure in a PYREG plant.

The advan­tage: Untreated manure such as liquid manure consists largely of water and some­times contains high concen­tra­tions of endocrine disruptors or drug resi­dues. Sepa­ra­tion, drying and carbo­na­tion drasti­cally reduce the amount of liquid manure and result in a hygie­nised, dry, stor­able and trans­por­table recy­cling ferti­lizer. In addi­tion, large quan­ti­ties of CO2 emis­sions are saved.

Green­house trials have already shown that the ferti­li­zing effect of carbon ferti­li­zers is just as good as that of conven­tional mineral ferti­li­zers. Two field trials with maize near Bingen (Germany) and Bell (Germany) should now confirm these results.

German Tele­vi­sion has reported about our project. The report, unfor­tu­n­a­tely only in German language, can be viewed here in the media library of the SWR.