Grass clip­pings are increas­ing­ly becom­ing a sought-after raw mate­r­i­al in Europe and world­wide, not only as ani­mal feed and lit­ter and thus as fer­til­iz­er, but also as a car­bon sink and sup­pli­er. The future use of grass clip­pings is the focus of an EU research project, which goes by the Eng­lish name “GO-GRASS”, runs for four years, from Octo­ber 2019 to Sep­tem­ber 2023, and pro­vides the part­ners with a total of 10 mil­lion euros in fund­ing. The Ger­man demon­stra­tion project in the low­er Oder val­ley is bud­get­ed at just under 850,000 euros. Oth­er part­ners are Hun­gary, Roma­nia and Spain, who will lat­er exam­ine the demon­stra­tion projects devel­oped by Swe­den, Den­mark and the Nether­lands for their prac­ti­cal suit­abil­i­ty. A total of 22 part­ners, for exam­ple uni­ver­si­ties, research insti­tutes and nature con­ser­va­tion orga­ni­za­tions, from eight Euro­pean coun­tries are involved. That is the project coör­di­na­tor Leib­niz Insti­tute for Agri­cul­tur­al Engi­neer­ing and Bioe­con­o­my (ATB) in Potsdam.

In Den­mark, Ger­many, the Nether­lands and Swe­den, one type of use of grass is being exam­ined in detail. In the Ger­man demon­stra­tion project, the pro­duc­tion of biochar, also known as biochar for fer­til­iza­tion, is being inves­ti­gat­ed. The start­ing mate­r­i­al used is the cut of a late, sin­gle mow­ing from the pold­er areas of the nation­al park, for which there has so far been lit­tle use, for exam­ple in the pro­duc­tion of biodiesel, bioethanol or bio­gas, as this late cut has a low­er nutri­ent qual­i­ty and a high degree of lig­ni­fi­ca­tion. As a start­ing point for the pro­duc­tion of biochar, how­ev­er, this het­ero­ge­neous and moist grass clip­pings can cer­tain­ly be con­sid­ered. The car­boniza­tion is to take place in a pilot plant with the help of a ther­mo­chem­i­cal con­ver­sion (pyrol­y­sis or hydrother­mal car­boniza­tion) in an agri­cul­tur­al enter­prise. The end prod­uct can be used on agri­cul­tur­al land to improve sandy soils with low soil val­ues. The addi­tion of biochar is said to have a pos­i­tive influ­ence on soil prop­er­ties such as water reten­tion capac­i­ty or nutri­ent exchange. Since the direct use of biochar from grass is cur­rent­ly not per­mit­ted in Ger­many, this biochar is added to the bed­ding as an inter­me­di­ate step. The biochar in the lit­ter binds mois­ture, but also organ­ic and min­er­al nitro­gen com­pounds in the sta­bles. Ani­mal excre­tions are absorbed by the biochar, which of course improves the sta­ble cli­mate and thus direct­ly ben­e­fits the ani­mal wel­fare, but also the peo­ple who work there.

In Swe­den is made of reed grass by bri­quet­ting hygi­en­ized lit­ter for ani­mal hus­bandry. After being used in the barn, the lit­ter mate­r­i­al can also be used as fer­til­iz­er or used in bio­gas production.

In the Nether­lands is made from land­scape and lane verge grass paper. This project is par­tic­u­lar­ly note­wor­thy, as grass is processed here, which has so far only found lit­tle use, main­ly because of its pol­lu­tion with heavy met­als or oth­er impu­ri­ties. Through a cer­tain pre­treat­ment and fer­men­ta­tion, fiber com­po­nents are extract­ed from the mow­ing and processed into high-qual­i­ty paper in fur­ther processes.

In Den­mark is extract­ed with the help of a biore­fin­ery from grass from nitrate-sen­si­tive areas and from palu­di­cul­ture. The prod­uct is a pro­tein con­cen­trate that can be added to feed as a nutri­tion­al sup­ple­ment for pigs and chick­ens. The pro­tein con­cen­trate con­tains a lot of ener­gy and impor­tant nutri­ents for the ani­mals. In the future, the import of soy-based pro­tein could be reduced with grass protein.

We are proud to be able to rep­re­sent Ger­many in this impor­tant research project and will keep our read­ers up to date on the progress made here in Ger­many, but also with our Euro­pean partners.