What does a future market for a circular bioeconomy look like?

Utilisation of biomass: making high value products

Green mass, such as straw from agriculture, grass clippings, as well as seaweed and seagrass from beach wrack, are promising and valuable biomass resources, although often just considered wastes. They contain a myriad of components that can be used in the food, pharmaceutical, chemical, and bioenergy industries. These biomasses are naturally renewed every year, and they can contribute to fulfilling market needs providing several biomass components used in existing products.

With just enough innovation, these biomasses might even be used to make entirely new products that replace existing ones made from non-renewable resources. The great advantage, in market terms, is that these byproducts, or often called “wastes”, do not require investments to be produced, but only collected and processed. Therefore, once they are already available, their potential should be fully explored.

With this webinar series, that is part of the project Power Bio, we aim to bring insights and shed light on some of the challenges faced when making high value products out of biomass, especially the ones considered surpluses. This leads us to framing answers to the bigger question “what does a future market for a circular bioeconomy look like?”