Upcycling, the idea of doing extra with much less, is nothing new. Reusing previous bread in new recipes – suppose French toast or salad croutons – and remodeling surplus cream from cheese manufacturing into butter are all examples of upcycling.
Even Unilever-owned British unfold Marmite began its life as an upcycled product, constituted of discarded yeast from breweries.
However with one-third of meals produced globally every year misplaced or wasted, to nice environmental and financial price, upcycling is having a second. Valorising meals manufacturing aspect streams into substances presents a viable manner of reducing waste and bettering earnings.
One main hurdle many upcycling innovators want to beat is securing aspect stream provide. In what is usually a really seasonal enterprise, how do entrepreneurs guarantee they’ve considerable uncooked materials to work with all year long?
And in the event that they can safe ample provide, is specialising within the manufacturing of 1 upcycled meals ingredient sufficient?
Securing provide and tackling batch variation
Securing provide and limiting batch variation is a problem, in response to Luca Fichtinger, founding father of Austria-based Kern Tec – a start-up upcycling stone fruit pits into substances for the dairy business, amongst others.
“Each batch is totally different, which is why standardisation is vital when going into upcycling,” he advised delegates at F&A Subsequent, an occasion hosted by Rabobank, Wageningen College & Analysis, Anterra Capital and StartLife, within the Netherlands.
Kern Tec approaches this problem in two methods: the start-up creates bigger batches standardised product; and makes use of smaller batches from sure areas for particular purposes, that means it’s primarily standardising for every product.
The corporate sources its aspect streams – apricot, cherry and plum pits – from jam and juice processors. Thus far, Kern Tech has processed round 2,000 tonnes of those uncooked supplies, and must safe sustainable provide for the longer term.
Whereas these partnerships are based on contracts and relationship constructing, Kern Tec understands making certain long-term provide can also be reliant the worth the start-up is keen to pay. “On the finish of the day, it’s actually about one factor: maximising the worth creation for either side stream,” he defined.
“In our case, we not solely give attention to the seeds but additionally on valorising the shells into substances for the beauty or landscaping business…It’s important to valorise the fabric to its finest, and at this level, you’re protected towards competitors.
“When you’ve got the very best valorisation, who else will be capable of pay greater costs for the uncooked materials?”
Brewer’s spent yeast from beer majors or craft brewers?
Dutch start-up revyve can also be growing meals substances from would-be waste streams, however as an alternative of stone fruit pits, the start-up is leveraging brewer’s spent yeast. Useful meals substances within the pipeline embrace an egg protein various.
In working with brewer’s spent yeast, a aspect stream from the beer brewing course of, seasonality is much less of a difficulty. “That’s the good benefit of yeast vs most crops: individuals brew beer all yr via,” stated revyve CEO Credric Verstraeten on the occasion.
Europe’s ‘wealthy’ brewing heritage makes it a ‘great spot for upcycling brewer’s yeast’, he added. “There’s sufficient provide, we’re not frightened about working out anytime quickly.”
However that doesn’t imply batch variability is non-existent. There could be day-to-day variability within the product, in addition to a seasonality within the varieties of yeast the start-up receives from brewers: in summer season brewers are more likely to brew extra lagers, and in winter, extra ales.
One other essential issue to think about is scale. The beginning-up is searching for breweries able to dealing with variability in provide, relying on its want. Because of this, revyve is working with bigger gamers throughout the brewing business.
“Sadly, you may’t work with a craft brewery who isn’t going to be consultant of the variability of the volumes you should take care of whenever you [product] at scale. So we partnered very early on with larger [players],” he revealed.
‘One ingredient isn’t sufficient’
One other firm not wanting provide is Citrosuco spin-off Evera. The corporate is upcycling aspect streams from orange juice manufacturing, such because the peel and fibre, into dietary fibres, oil essences and different substances for meals and pharmaceutical industries.
Having been spun out from Brazilian headquartered Citrosuco, one of many world’s largest orange juice producers, Evera has a ‘huge’ provide of uncooked materials in its yard, stated Evera industrial director Alex Schuermans. “At this second, we’ve two million tonnes of…very wealthy biomass that’s accessible for Evera to discover.”
The spin-off firm’s problem subsequently doesn’t lie in securing provide, however in diversifying its valorisation. Producing a pectin ingredient from oranges could possibly be an apparent product selection, however with the quantity of biomass accessible to Evera, the spin-off would ‘flood’ the market with twice the quantity of pectin at present consumed. “It’s good to have plenty of totally different options [for valorisation], there’s not one magic one,” Schuermans advised delegates.
As an alternative, upcycling corporations must be frequently exploring new ingredient alternatives, the industrial director advised. In Evera’s case, the corporate is initially working with oranges however desires to develop past Citrosuco’s major uncooked materials to develop a various substances portfolio for the B2B market.
“Orange is our place to begin for apparent causes, [but the goal is to create] an substances firm that finds each single alternative throughout the orange, then with the expertise we use to valorise these streams, why not transfer onto different uncooked supplies?
“It’s a complete journey that’s undoubtedly not with [just] one product.”
