Industrial ecology flows of agriculture and food industry in Finland: utilizing by-products and wastes

SUMMARY

Industrial ecology (IE) studies the physical flows of matter and energy within, and most importantly, between the natural ecosystem and the human industrial system, aiming to reduce the environmental burden of the flows. One of the applications used is to transform the industrial system linear ‘throughput’ material and energy flow that relies on imported non-renewables, on virgin renewables and produces wastes and emissions dumped to nature toward a cyclical and cascading ‘roundput’ flow that relies on local/regional renewables and wastes. The paper constructs a key function or an anchor activity that integrates the throughput material and energy flows and changes them into the roundput model in a local/regional agricultural and food industry system in Finland. This key activity is able to simultaneously utilise and process waste flows from the main steps in the food products' life cycle (value chain) and produce energy and fertiliser to the different processes in the life cycle by using waste as a fuel and as a resource with value. Difficulties in achieving this vision in practice are discussed. The paper uses national data from Finland, regional data from the Satakunta region in southwest Finland and local data from the municipality of Huittinen in Satakunta. A methodology in which environmental, economic and social variables are studied with different ‘what if?’ scenarios for the roundput model and for the throughput model is presented.

Key words:

• Industrial ecology
• material and energy flows
• throughput
• roundput agriculture
• food industry
• waste fuels
• energy
• fertilisers