UNLOCK

Unlocking a feather bioeconomy for keratin-based agricultural products

Project details

Type of project: Innovation Action - Demonstration
Project focus: Bio-based polymers & plastics
Feedstock origin: Agri-food waste
Feedstock type: Food industry sidestreams

Project period: 1 May 2021 - 30 April 2025
Status: Completed
CBE JU Contribution: € 5 108 554,00
Call identifier: H2020-BBI-JTI-2020

Summary

Europe’s poultry sector produces about 3.6 million tonnes of feathers every year, yet only a quarter is collected separately, mostly for animal feed and fertilisers. Feathers are rich in keratin, a valuable protein that improves the degradability of bioplastics and enriches the soil with nitrogen as it decomposes. The UNLOCK project developed technologies and agricultural products to make the most of this underused waste stream.

The project’s consortium covered the whole value chain, from feedstock analysis to product fabrication and sustainability assessments. It brought feather treatment technologies (sterilisation and shredding, steam explosion and microbial fermentation) to three demonstration plants in Poland and Sweden. The project produced four keratin-enriched agricultural products: seed trays, nonwoven geotextiles, mulch films and hydroponic foams. Treated feathers biodegrade much faster than untreated ones, supporting the EU’s shift away from fossil-based materials.

More information

Core focus: Valorise feathers from poultry processing as a source of keratin for agricultural applications.
Smart logistics and treatment: Develop efficient logistic strategies and feather treatment technologies to overcome the difficulties of collecting and processing feathers.
Fossil replacement: Replace fossil-based raw materials with renewable, bio-based ones, contributing to the EU’s long-term strategy for climate neutrality.
Agricultural products: Develop bio-based seed trays, nonwoven geotextiles, mulch films and hydroponic foams.
Soil and end-of-life benefits: Design biodegradation to match crop duration and return nitrogen to the soil, leaving no waste at end of life.
Feather-based bioeconomy: Establish a new value chain linking the poultry sector, bio-based industries and agriculture.

Results

Value chain analysis: Analysed the poultry sector in Europe, focusing on the five leading producers (Germany, France, Spain, Poland and Italy), and proposed solutions to the hurdles facing a feather-based value chain.
Feather treatment technologies: Tested the technologies successfully at pilot scale and built three demo plants. One in Poland sterilises and shreds feathers at 200 kg/h, and two in Sweden use steam explosion and microbial fermentation.
Faster biodegradation: Showed that treated feathers biodegrade much faster than untreated ones.
Keratin-based bioplastics: Developed formulations with adaptable end of life, in which treated feathers speed up disintegration.
Four agricultural products:
- Seed trays: compostable under industrial conditions, with strong market growth potential.
- Nonwoven geotextiles: used for crop protection, partially biodegradable in soil and fully compostable, releasing up to 15 g of nitrogen per m².
- Mulch films: designed for short-term crops, with a function similar to the geotextiles.
- Hydroponic foams: replace clay pebbles in hydroponic substrates, releasing nitrogen and decomposing in the soil or composting industrially.

Impacts

Environmental: Reduces reliance on fossil-based plastics and the associated pollution, including microplastics, while adding nitrogen to soils and cutting waste.
Economic: Turns a low-value, largely uncollected waste stream into higher-value materials, with no end-of-life disposal costs for growers.
Social: Creates new jobs in feather collection, conversion and bio-based industries, many in rural areas.
Market: Offers new bio-based alternatives to fossil-based agricultural products, with the potential to outperform conventional materials.
Replication: Can be applied to the major poultry-producing countries, building on the demonstration plants in Poland and Sweden.
Policy: Supports the EU’s phase-out of fossil-based materials and its path to climate neutrality.

Consortium map

Project coordination

FUNDACION CIDETEC San Sebastian, Spain

Consortium

ATLANTIS PERIVALLON KAI KAINOTOMIA LIMITED Nicosia, Cyprus
BIOEXTRAX AB Lund, Sweden
AIMPLAS - ASOCIACION DE INVESTIGACION DE MATERIALES PLASTICOS Y CONEXAS Paterna, Spain
FARRELLY AND MITCHELL BUSINESS CONSULTANTS LIMITED Dublin, Ireland
TERRA AQUATICA SAS Fleurance, France
CEDROB SPOLKA AKCYJNA CIECHANOW, Poland
SIEC BADAWCZA LUKASIEWICZ - LODZKI INSTYTUT TECHNOLOGICZNY odz, Poland
FUNDACJA UNIMOS WARSZAWA, Poland
ASSOCIACIO COMARCAL URGELL D'AJUDA AL MINUSVALID Mollerussa, Spain
NORMEC OWS GENT, Belgium
NUEVAS TECNOLOGIAS PARA EL DESARROLLO DE PACKAGING Y PRODUCTOS AGROALIMENTARIOS CON COMPONENTE PLASTICA SL Zaragoza, Spain
RISE PROCESSUM AB ORNSKOLDSVIK, Sweden
BIO-MI DRUSTVO S OGRANICENOM ODGOVORNOSCU ZA PROIZVODNJU, ISTRAZIVANJEI RAZVOJ Matulji, Croatia
GREENOVATE ! EUROPE Bruxelles / Brussel, Belgium