As a first step for a system definition, a knowledge baseline was compiled in terms of rural requirements, European and regional regulations, and business environments of grassland agro-food systems in the EU. Based on this, assessment KPIs were identified and most appropriate economic, environmental and social indicators were selected for the evaluation of grass-based business cases.
Another knowledge baseline that was compiled is a comprehensive overview of processes and technologies needed for each DEMO and necessary development steps for these technologies. Each business case requires different specific grass quality aspects, which are influenced by grassland pre-treatment technologies. Therefore, grassland management, available harvesting, storage and preservations techniques, related socioeconomic issues, and logistics of distribution were documented.
The completion of the deployment plan and the operation and evaluation plan for all four DEMOs finalized the planning phase of the project and induced the transition to the implementation phase. The Danish and Swedish DEMOs are already deployed and running, while the Dutch and German DEMOs are at a very initial stage with key technologies at an experimental stage.
The Danish DEMO focuses on the production of protein feed concentrate for monogastric animal feed, a press cake fiber fraction for ruminant animal feed and bioenergy production via anaerobic digestion of residual sidestreams. The concept is referred to as green biorefinery and can potentially include several other alternative products besides protein feed. A project highlight in September 2020 was the visit of the Danish DEMO by project partners.
The objective of the Swedish DEMO is to develop a manufacturing plant to produce reed canary grass-based animal bedding that is profitable at farm level. The used bedding material is digested in the farm’s biogas plant. The results show that after the transition from wood to grass bedding material, biogas production was increased by 13%.
The German DEMO focuses on the usage of late harvested grass from the Lower Oder Valley National Park. In this DEMO biochar is being produced for site specific application as soil amendment. So far, biochar was produced with three different technologies at lab scale.
In the Dutch DEMO low quality grass from nature land and road verges is used to isolate the fibers and use them to produce paper and carton substituting (partly) wood fibers. The three main steps of the Dutch demo are the harvest and storage of the grass, the digesting of the grass and the papermaking process.
The goal of the impact assessment is to guarantee social, economic and environmental sustainability of the demo sites. The results will provide recommendations for changes and improvements in the DEMOs, assess their potential for replication and support the decision-making process towards the choice of new grass-based rural business models.
The business modelling & exploitation strategy is to ensure maximum impact of the project by supporting the exploitation of the DEMOs. The development of an exploitation strategy involved the adaptation of a questionnaire to obtain an overview of expected GO-GRASS DEMO results. After data collection, coaching meetings were held and results were used to formulate the Preliminary Exploitation Plan followed by two online Exploitation Workshops on consortium level focusing on result exploitation and IPR strategy.
Integrated Circular Scenarios include the development a set of optimal value chains for grassland-based food systems that can be replicated in different countries and business environments. It was also found that several of the GO-GRASS DEMO innovative products are spurring the development of new markets.
The Multi-Actor Engagement will lead to a thorough understanding of production value chains, stakeholder structures and farmer and consumer preferences and the Social Innovation Strategies will sparking a change towards sustainable consumption behaviour for bio-based products. A stakeholder mapping was completed and consequently stakeholder board meetings were hold at each DEMO.
Replication and Capacity Building Activities aim to maximize potential project impact by ensuring replicable, useable and scalable project results beyond the project lifetime. These activities, in an initial phase, include the strategy of replication that is based on previous deliverables produced. The tool for business case assessment and funding was adapted to project needs, but continuous refining is needed.
Strategies for the Dissemination & Communication of the project results were developed in order to support replication, upscaling and exploitation and to facilitate social engagement activities. GO-GRASS project tools can be assessed trough the GO-GRASS webpage, as well as reports, publications and dissemination material. Events are promoted through Twitter and LinkedIn. To increase the D&C potential, GO-GRASS partners were trained in ‘Social Media’ and Project videos were uploaded to a YouTube channel. A visual identity was created for GO-GRASS, including logo, templates for presentations, a brochure as well as articles and videos. Large event activities were hold including an online event at the EU Green Week and a mid-term set of practice abstracts.
