WASTE2FUNC: From food waste to biosurfactants and lactic acid

In this project we aimed to demonstrate the production of biosurfactants and lactic acid from food waste from agriculture, the food industry, supermarkets and restaurants.

Within the project, several objectives have been worked on and this will be generally be described below. Meanwhile the project has ended (November 2024).

If you directly want more technical information on how the project was build up, this is summarized under Project Overview. If you want to discover the key results of the project you can have a look on the Results page or on the News page.

A first objective was the development of a a registration website/app to register food waste flows from the agriculture and food industry for collection by a waste collector. Therefore intensive consultation with farmers about how the collection of such food waste is worthwhile and what compensation should be given in return was organised. In addition, consultations were also aimed to be held about the availability of these waste streams, both among farmers and the food industry.

Secondly, technology was developed prior to the project to enable production of biosurfactants and lactic acid from supermarket and restaurant food waste and the second objective was to demonstrate these technologies and target TRL6-7. Within the WASTE2FUNc project, this continuously available waste stream was supplemented with waste streams from agriculture such as:

• Fruit and vegetables that do not meet the “standards” and are therefore difficult to sell in auctions (too small, strange shape, …)
• Burnt fruit from extreme summers
• Rotten fruit and vegetables due to extreme climate causes
• …

On the other hand, this was supplemented with waste streams and side streams from the food industry, such as:

• Batches from certain food companies that can no longer be sold due to various circumstances (e.g. due to a broken cold room or freezer room failures)
• Side streams and waste streams from the food industry that currently have no end-use

As mentioned above, all the above flows have no end-use and they rot on the field or are discarded and often incinerated. This leads to unnecessary CO₂ emissions and can therefore be avoided by using the streams to further convert into biological soaps and bioplastics.

The technology already developed prior to the project to enable the conversion was aimed to be further optimized within the WASTE2FUNC project and brought to a pre-industrial scale. This would make it possible to investigate the economic feasibility of all developed technology and this new value chain and to examine the sustainability of the entire process. Furthermore, also potential regulatory hurdles have been investigated and resolved and business models were be set up.

Together with environmental, economic, social and regulatory analyses and constant optimization, performed by the WASTE2FUNC project partners, the aim was to decrease CO2 emissions with at least 20% and increase value from waste with 2-10 fold and create (high tech) jobs for the primary- and downstream sector in Belgium and Europe.

The ultimate goal at the end of the project was to have a view on the potential of establishing a biorefinery in which functional molecules can be made from all this collected food waste in a sustainable and economically profitable way. These functional molecules can subsequently be used as building blocks for bioplastics and as ingredients in cosmetics, in biological detergents and in numerous other applications. WASTE2FUNC will contribute to a more sustainable industry by using renewable resources and by its circular approach.