Digestate treatment enters a new phase: “A new dawn”
The webinar opened with an overview of how digestate management has evolved. Once largely focused on basic solid–liquid separation for cost reduction, modern facilities now face tighter regulations, rising environmental expectations and new requirements for water discharge and reuse. As presented in the Technomap snapshot, digestate treatment increasingly swifts also to a compact wastewater treatment plant, integrating biological steps, membrane systems, stripping technologies and resource recovery processes.
The water transition follows the energy transition
Driving this shift is the combination of regulatory pressure, demand for bio-based fertilizers and the need to close water cycles with the energy transition as true driven force. Every drop counts, including side streams such as condensate from dryers.
The role of the Technomap in developing reliable solutions
The Technomap continues to serve as a guide for selecting the right combination of technologies across the digestate and water treatment chain. The snapshot shared during the webinar illustrated how solutions can be tailored to feedstock variations, discharge requirements, reuse ambitions and local market constraints.
It also showed how modular, containerized systems are becoming more important. They offer scalable, predictable performance while reducing onsite construction complexity and logistics. This flexibility is especially valuable in a market defined by fluctuating feedstocks and diverse regulatory environments.
Four real projects, four different challenges
A key part of the webinar focused on four project cases, each illustrating a different local challenge and the pathway from problem to solution.
– A food waste facility requiring compliance with discharge limits after an An-MBR system.
– An agricultural and organic waste plant aiming to cut transport volumes and create high-value fertilizers.
– A public–private sludge processing site treating dryer condensate with a titanium membrane to reuse standards for a cooling water.
– A municipal and industrial sludge operation meeting tight specifications before sending treated effluent to a neighboring industrial wastewater treatment plant.
Building the right business case
The closing part of the webinar addressed the criteria needed to build a robust business case for digestate and water treatment. System design, flexibility, nutrient recovery efficiency, energy optimization and water polishing requirements all play a role. With growing interest in potential innovations such as finesieves, chemical-free stripping or struvite recovery, operators have more options than ever before.
Yet the core principle remains unchanged: the solution combination makes the difference.
Conclusion
The transition to more circular, efficient and decentralized systems has clearly begun. As the industry moves forward, shared knowledge and real-world examples will continue to shape smarter, more resilient digestate and water treatment strategies.
Nijhuis Saur Industries brings integrated solutions to address these technological barriers. With decades of expertise in wastewater, biogas, and resource recovery, NSI delivers complete solutions for waste to energy that combine digestate treatment, water reuse, and biogas purification in one plant.