Circular economy and sustainability

Luke provides expert services and solutions within circular economy and bioeconomy. Our core competence is in valorisation of biomass waste and side-streams for high value products. In addition, optimisation of nutrient cycles as a part of the entire valorisation chain plays an essential role on our research agenda.

Biomass side stream valorisation, modification and nutrient recycling

Luke provides a wide range of services, from environmentally sound refining, fractionation and extraction technologies for valorisation of biomass side streams to protein recovery and processing into high-value ingredients and products.

For food and forest industries, we offer comprehensive competence in utilising their by-products. Optimisation of nutrient cycles and recovery as part of the entire valorisation chain plays an essential role as well.

We offer process experiments, planning and designing of new holistic recovery concepts, optimisation and  development services, and development of new food and feed ingredients, extracts and related product prototypes.

Our core competences are microbiological processing, anaerobic digestion and biogas processes, enzymatic bioprocessing, slow pyrolysis, and extraction and fractionation – especially pressurised hot water/solvent extraction.

Characterisation of nutrient availability and fertilising effect of recycled fertilisers and biomass residues

Luke offers services determining the nutrient availability and plant-fertilising effect of different types of recycled fertilisers, such as end-products and residues from biogas plants and wastewater treatment.

We offer lab analysis, pot experiments and field-scale experiments for plant nutrition in agriculture and forestry. We also assess the applicability and feasibility of fertiliser transportation, storage and spreading on arable land and in forestry. Further, our expertise includes the use and formulation of ash and its recycling, especially in forestry.

Biomass availability for bio-circular economy concepts

Luke’s services and solutions provide information on the availability of biomass feedstocks and the feasibility of siting biorefineries or other bio-circular economy concepts. We perform assessments of regional biomass feedstock availability and costs at plant as well as the best logistic supply solution.

Our data sets and expertise cover a wide range of biomass types, including forest biomass, straw, silage, other plant waste, and manure.

Assessments of sustainability and material flows

Luke provides environmental and sustainability assessments of products and systems for companies and decision makers. Our high-quality services for the assessment of carbon, water and other footprints, material flows and efficiency, and environmental hot spots as well as other sustainability elements – including social impacts – help improve company operations, supply chains or holistic valorisation of biomasses.

We offer research based expert services for assessing the life cycle wide environmental impacts of bioeconomy products and supply chains. We help companies to define the environmental footprints and hot-spots of their products, make their processes more environmentally friendly and resource-efficient and improve their supply chain. Luke’s 3rd party LCA assessments are helping companies promote their products and building a positive brand image.