Climate and Environment

: Biogas produced from household waste reduces CO2 emissions. Compost creates a carbon sink with positive effects for the climate and the environment.

Transforming household waste back into useful resources through the use of Aikan Technology has a number of beneficial large-scale effects on climate and environment.

Carbon sink through use of Aikan Technology
Processing 1 tonne of organic household waste, results in 350-400 kilograms of compost which binds 2-300 kilograms of CO₂ to the soil. This is a very rough estimate and we would like to get in touch with researchers who can help us be more precise on this issue.

The net effect is an immediate carbon sink. Release of the carbon bound in compost is delayed up to 100 years, depending on local conditions (we need further scientific research into this figure as well). Considerable amounts of CO₂ can be bound in this way. This means that large-scale use of Aikan Technology could become a key element in national strategies for reducing carbon emissions.

In this video, professor Jorgen E. Olesen gives a general explanation of how a compost carbon sink works. Jorgen E. Olesen is a member of the IPCC (UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). He was also a member of the Danish Government’s Commission on Climate Change Policy.

Peak phosphorous
Phosphorous is rapidly becoming a scarce resource on a global scale. Commercial phosphate fertilizers are almost exclusively derived from phosphate rock, which is mined and exported from a limited number of countries worldwide.

According to most sources, the world’s current known supply of minable phosphate rock could be depleted within this century with a global peak in phosphate rock reserves estimated to occur in the next 30 years.

There are already clear signs of a looming but not yet widely recognized phosphorous supply crisis. For example, phosphate rock prices rose by up to 700 percent during the 2007-2008 food crisis.

With Aikan Technology, phosphorous from household waste is preserved and made reusable in the form of rich organic fertilizer. Treating one tonne of organic waste in an Aikan plant results in 350-400 kilograms of compost which contains approx. 4.5 kilograms of phosphorous.