The AQUA-COMBINE project consortia aim to demonstrate combined aquaculture and halophyte farming (farming of saline tolerant plants) using the principles of circular economy, where waste is recovered and utilised with-in the system to create both internal value and new products, beside avoiding the wastes. Residues are utilised with-in the system to create both internal value and new products. Excess nutrients from the fish production will be used as fertiliser for the halophyte plants and filtered through a microbial water treatment system to enable recirculation of the water back into the aquaculture tanks. All parts of the halophyte biomass will be used for production of multiple products such as food, feed, botanical extracts and pure bioactive compounds, as well as biogas from the final residues to produce energy and a nutrient rich residue to bring essential nutrients (e.g. phosphates) back to farmland. This combined aquaculture, farming, and bioprocessing can help desalinize salt effected areas and can easily be combined with sustainable management of natural areas and/or use of marginal lands to create value and jobs in rural, remote and salt affected and areas. The bioprocessing will create added value to the combined farming and diversify products.
Riasearch’s role at AQUA-COMBINE is to provide halophyte biomass (WP2), coordinate WP7 for Functional fish feed formulation and testing, to provide inputs for the technical and economic analysis for the pilot design (WP10), and to disseminate project results at Aquaculture related conferences.
Grant agreement ID
862834
Duration
4 years (1 October 2019 - 30 September 2023)
Title
Integrated on-farm Aquaponics systems for co-production of fish, halophyte vegetables, bioactive compounds, and bioenergy
Coordinator
AALBORG UNIVERSITET, Denmark
Funded under
H2020-EU.3.2.4.1.
Programme
H2020-EU.3.2.4.1. - Fostering the bio-economy for bio-based industries
Topic
CE-RUR-10-2019 - Circular bio-based business models for rural communities
Funding Scheme
IA - Innovation action
Overall budget EUR 11 072 052.34 | EU contribution EUR 9 789 883.64
EU contribution (Riasearch) EUR 380 907.63