Phosphate cycle at the Port

In the context of the collective programme 'Waste = raw material' implemented by the municipalities of Amsterdam (Port company and DMB) and Zaanstad, a sub-project is being set up in order to close the phosphate chain in the port industrial sector.

Green soup

Fairly recently (in the nineteen sixties, seventies and eighties), phosphate was the cause of the suffocating and odorous ‘green soup’ in Dutch waters. The green soup was caused by unchecked growth of algae and duckweed due to phosphates primarily in washing powders.

Artificial fertiliser

Phosphate is essential in artificial fertiliser. Where once phosphate was wasted extravagantly, it is now becoming a raw material that can run out in the foreseeable future. With all of the accompanying consequences, not least for - food production. The closing of phosphate chains therefore literally corresponds with 'waste = food'.

Phosphate recovery

In the port district of Zaanstad and Amsterdam there are a great many food producing companies that dump phosphates, frequently in a watery solution. Recovering and using this in artificial fertiliser closes the biological chain. ICL Fertilizer produces artificial fertiliser and would like to have these phosphates, which are currently seeping away. This, they say, will give the company a worldwide innovative lead in this field and will ensure that the life span of the phosphate mines owned by the concern is extended, and this will then give ICL a strategic advantage over its competitors.

More projects

There are plans to start up many more of this type of project in the Zaanstad/Amsterdam port districts.

Source: Nieuws Amsterdamklimaat - 10 June 2010