Producing novel non-plant biomass feedstocks and bio-based products through upcycling and the cascading use of brewery side-streams
The Institute of Sustainable Processes is taking part in the EU-funded Horizon Europe project CHEERS (topic HORIZON-CL6-2021-CIRCBIO-01-05). CHEERS is a new biorefinery concept, inspired by nature’s biodiversity (insect and microbial platforms) with the objective of revalorising underutilised or waste secondary streams such as bagasse, wastewater, CO2 and CH4 from the brewing industry for conversion into innovative bio-based products that are competitive at market level. CHEERS sustainable transformation processes using innovative biological platforms inspired by nature will be validated on a demonstration scale at Mahou San Miguel’s brewery in Alovera (ES).
CHEERS offers a modular solution where bio-based industries can configure their optimal combination by selecting from 5 novel biotechnological routes that generate 5 bioproducts for industrial applications, with attractive market opportunities: insect protein, disinfectant, microbial protein, ectoin and caproic acid. All CHEERS value chains are based on new bioprocesses and/or innovative biofermenters combined with sustainable transformation processes, which will be validated at demonstration scale in an industrial brewery. Ultimately, a minimum 45% reduction of the carbon footprint will be achieved in each value chain.
Our role within the project will be the microbial bioconversion of methane into ectoine using innovative Taylor flow biofermentors.
The project started on September 1st, 2022, it will last 4 years and gathers 11 partners and 1 affiliated entity from 5 different countries:
MAHOU San Miguel (Project coordinator) (Spain), AQUALIA (Spain), HIDROTEC (Affiliated entity) (Spain), AINIA (Spain), Universidad de Valladolid – Instituto de Procesos Sostenibles (Spain), PROTEINSECTA (Spain), Innovarum (Spain), Symrise AG (Germany), Genia Bioenergy (Spain), Syspro Automation (Spain), ThunderFoods (Portugal), ZHAW (Switzerland), Earthwatch (United Kingdom).
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Contact information: info@cheers-project.eu
