Environment sustainability

New Industrial Symbiosis Park Converts Manufacturing Waste into Feedstock

New Industrial Symbiosis Park Converts Manufacturing Waste into Feedstock, Cutting 92,000 t CO₂ Annually

A next-generation industrial symbiosis park launched today in Śmiłowo demonstrates that one company’s trash can be another’s balance-sheet asset. The Farmutil Eco-Industrial Park, Europe’s largest agri-food symbiosis cluster, now diverts 300,000 tonnes of meat-processing waste from landfills each year and converts it into 110,000 tonnes of meat-bone-meal biofuel, 120,000 tonnes of organic fertilizer and 460,000 gigajoules of renewable heat. Independent auditors calculate the closed-loop system eliminates 92,000 tonnes of CO₂-equivalent emissions annually—equal to taking 20,000 passenger cars off the road.

“Industrial symbiosis is no longer a sustainability buzzword; it is a proven profit engine,” said Piotr Kowalski, CEO of Farmutil S.A., the park’s anchor tenant. “By connecting slaughterhouses, feed mills, biogas plants and fertilizer producers through a single material-and-energy web, we have turned disposal costs into €100 million of gross profit while meeting the EU’s most stringent emissions standards.”

The park’s “waste-to-feedstock” model is being watched closely by policymakers eager to replicate its resource-efficiency gains. According to a 2023 peer-reviewed study, the Śmiłowo facility’s cascading use of animal by-products, process steam and pig slurry has lifted the park’s resource output rate by 162 percent while driving the industrial-solid-waste utilization rate to 97.5 percent—metrics that outpace Europe’s best-performing steel-recycling hubs.

Market data underscore the growth runway for symbiosis-based parks. The European Commission estimates that wider adoption of industrial symbiosis could generate €78 billion in annual material-cost savings across the bloc by 2030 and create 160,000 skilled jobs in recycling, engineering and biochemical processing. Globally, the International Synergies Network reports that every euro invested in symbiosis infrastructure returns €9–€13 in private-sector value within five years, primarily through avoided input purchases and landfill fees.

Construction of the park’s second phase—an electro-chemical CO₂ utilization unit—will begin in January 2026 under the EU’s ICO2NIC program. The €28 million module will capture residual fermentation CO₂ and convert it into formic acid, a preservative and silage additive already used by regional dairy farms. When fully operational, the unit is expected to sequester an additional 24,000 tonnes of CO₂ per year while producing 30,000 tonnes of high-purity formic acid for export markets.

Environmental regulators have praised the park’s transparent monitoring regime. Real-time sensors track 32 material and energy flows, uploading data to a cloud dashboard accessible to Poland’s Chief Inspectorate for Environmental Protection. Third-party verification by TÜV Rheinland confirms that airborne particulate emissions from the bio-drying lines remain 82 percent below the EU limit for animal-fat processing plants.

About Farmutil S.A.

Farmutil is Poland’s largest integrated agri-food group, processing 2.4 million tonnes of grain and 1.1 million head of livestock annually. The company operates six production facilities and exports to 42 countries. Farmutil’s shares are listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange (WSE: FUT).