Inauguration of the Centre for Circular Bioeconomy shed light on one of society’s most important problems

With pride and joy, Aarhus University inaugurated its new Centre for Circular Bioeconomy (CBIO) in Foulum on May 23, 2017. The centre, which has Senior Researcher Uffe Jørgensen, KLIMA, as its leader, is a unique research platform in which research in sustainable production, consumption and recycling of biomass all come together and where biological waste and byproducts are transformed to value products. 

It was a happy and festive day but the raison d’être of the centre is based on a serious problem: We humans use much more of the Earth’s limited resources than it can maintain in the long run. If we all consumed on the same level as in Denmark, then we would need three whole globes. Needless to say, this cannot go on forever – and that was the focus of several of the talks given at the inauguration.  

Words alone cannot make the problems go away.Therefore, many people are taking action and supporting CBIO’s activities directly or indirectly now and in the future. One of these stakeholders is the Central Denmark Region. At the CBIO inauguration the chairman of the Regional Council Bent Hansen revealed that the Central Denmark Region has granted 12.5 million kroner to a ”Development Programme for Bioeconomy” which, with a total budget of 21 million kroner, will give commercial companies access to the quickly growing global market for new sustainable products and technologies.   

The chairman of the govenment's advisory board on circular economy and chairman of Carlsberg A/S and the Carlsberg Foundation, Professor Flemming Besenbacher, iNANO, has written the foreword of the document ”Delivering the circular economy – a toolkit for policymakers”, which has the attention of policymakers not only in Denmark but also abroad. 

He pointed out that we will experience an enormous paradigm shift in the 21^st century. It will be a challenge – but not an impossibility – to feed and provide clean water for the 10 billion people that are expected to populate the world in 2050. To solve the problems it is crucial that politicians invest in education, research and innovation.  

- Circular economy means using common sense when designing, producing, consuming and getting rid of what we no longer need. There is good economy in sharing and gaining access to products without owning them. We must design our products so they can be repaired and maintained. Recycling must be the norm. A shift to a circular economy will be a golden business and export potential for Denmark and bioeconomy is an integral part of circular economy, said Flemming Besenbacher. 

Flemming Besenbacher brought up global challenges, including our much too large consumption of the Earth's resources. Photo: Lars Kruse

You can view Flemming Besenbacher's presentation on the O-drive here: O:\ST_AGRO\Klima\UFJ\CBIO\CBIO presentationer 23May 

Unique facilities

The new centre is unique because we can carry out research in how best to cultivate the crops (e.g. grass, seaweed or mussels), transform them to energy, refine them, create new products (e.g. feed, food or biomaterials), and feed them to our farm animals. 

CBIO has access to facilities that include the world’s largest research biogas plant, the world’s largest HTL plant, and 20 ha of ocean for the cultivation of algae and mussels. The new centre connects all these links in a coherent chain and CBIO’s leader is looking forward to getting started. 

- For years, we have worked with all aspects of the value chain and there is a lot of perspective in gathering and strengthening these activities in one centre, thus ensuring more synergy. I am therefore looking forward to being able to integrate knowledge from all along the value chain and in the long run to developing, analysing and initiating concrete product chains in collaboration with the industry, said Uffe Jørgensen at the inauguration. 

- I am pleased that the Centre for Circulær Bioeconomy will be able to raise the research in the area to new heights and continue the development of all the good contacts and ideas we have and will get in cooperation with other research institutions and the industry. There is a wealth of interesting possibilities for future projects, said Uffe Jørgensen.

Fra meadow to meal: Researchers are working on developing technology so that grass can be biorefined to e.g. protein feed. Photos: Janne Hansen

Dean Niels Chr. Nielsen expressed great pleasure with the opening of CBIO:

- The centre represents the first of seven thematic centres at ST that aim to address the global grand challenges and growth technologies that are important to society. The ambition is that CBIO will bring Aarhus University to the international forefront in relation to using biological resources where emissions and losses from processes can be reduced markedly. In this way we can have sustainable intensification – more with less – which is imortant wih regard to ensuring food security for a large population without destroying our ecosystems, he said.

Grassy knees and clover juice

After the inaugural talks in the auditorium, the participants donned plastic booties as protection against the elements and went on a tour of the various facilities. The first item on the outdoor agenda was, however, the official opening. 

Rector Brian Bech Nielsen, Niels Christian Nielsen, Flemming Besenbacher, Uffe Jørgensen, and Head of Open Innovation Harry J. Barazza, Arla Innovation Center, went out into the field to cut the ribbon to the new centre. To be more precise: They went down on their knees on red pillows in the meadow with each their little hedge trimmer to cut each their little sheaf of grass tied with a festive red ribbon.

From the front: Dean Niels Christian Nielsen, Rector Brian Bech Nielsen, Harry J. Barazza og Flemming Besenbacher cut grass sheafs. Photo: Janne Hansen

DCA – Danish Centre for Food and Agriculture had organised the practical details of the successful event where everything went off without a hitch. Uffe Jørgensen and DCA had even made sure that the food and drinks had a circular bioeconomy theme, where a range of hors d’oeuvres and beverages containing ingredients such as mussels, seaweed – including dulse – and red clover were eagerly consumed by the 166 participants.  

Read the article Uffe Jørgensen, Section for Climate and Water, will lead Aarhus University’s new interdisciplinary centre CBIO (internal AGRO article) and Aarhus Universitet indvier Center for Cirkulær Bioøkonomi (in Danish) 

View the TV spot about the inauguration on TV Midtvest here (in Danish) and read Well-attended opening of the Centre for Circular Bioeconomy (internal ST article). 

The Centre for Biorefinery Technologies, which is an integrated part of CBIO, was opened concurrently. You can read about that new centre here: Danish engineers at the forefront of advancing biorefinery from theory to practice. 

Read more about the Centre for Circular Bioeconomy (CBIO) on the centre’s own website here (in Danish).