“Phosphorus Recovery” Collaboration Project

Phosphorus (P) is an essential building block in all living organisms and is needed as a fertilizer in agriculture. Phosphate ores are limited worldwide and increasingly contaminated. For this reason, the EU added phosphorus to its list of critical raw materials in 2014. Recovery from sewage sludge plays a central role, and the legal framework for this has now been established.

The goal of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is to promote innovative and economically viable solutions for regional phosphorus recycling (RePhoR). The concept, developed in collaboration with project partners, convinced the jury: Out of 43 submitted projects, 7 were approved.

The “DreiSATS” consortium project aims to conduct practical testing and demonstration of an innovative, economically viable, and technically sound process chain for decentralized thermal sewage sludge treatment with phosphorus recycling and subsequent product recycling.