Organic waste-to-energy project launched in Tunisia in association with France’s IRD

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(TAP) - A project of energy recovery of organic waste for the production of bio-hydrogen was launched Tuesday in Hammamet.

It is a 5-year renewable cooperation project between France's "Institut de recherche pour le développement" (IRD) and the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research of Tunisia.

A laboratory has been created within the Higher Institute of Applied Biological Sciences; Tunisian and French research teams will work together on the project, researcher in charge Hana Kanoun told TAP.

"This is an exceptional event because this research laboratory has scientific, economic and social importance. It will seek to find solutions to the problem of waste management through adopting new recovery scenarios," she added.

She noted that a small core of Tunisian researchers has been working since 2017 to create this laboratory, which now includes 6 multi-purpose research teams divided into the 6 main areas of the waste recovery project.

Kanoun welcomed the success of the experiments of waste valorisation for the production of bio-hydrogen in small quantities at the laboratory.

This success has led the project leaders to develop it in partnership with the IRD and to turn it into a large laboratory.

The aim is to eventually move on to the creation of a start-up or a waste-to-energy company for biomass production.