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Merry's System: Food Waste Composting and Creating Recycling Loop

Merry's System: Food Waste Composting and Creating Recycling Loop

Well Create Co., Ltd.

Effective Solution to Food     Wastes by a Community-based Composting System

R
educing food wastes disposed by incineration and landfilling have been an important issue in our daily life. To this issue, Well Create Co., Ltd. provides an effective solution with carbon offset model, by constructing a community-   based composting system.
The composting center equipped with food waste recycling facility operated by the company collects food wastes discharged from hospitals, hotels, wholesale markets etc. and produces compost in the process of shedding, dehydration and fermentation in a composting machine.
                                                                  Fig. 1 Composting Process of food waste

Compost is used for the cultivation of rice and vegetables in neighboring farmland. In addition, Well Create Co., Ltd. sells composting machines so that hospitals, hotels and wholesale markets can install and operate composting machines by themselves.

                                                                 Fig. 2 Scheme of food waste recycling

Major Features and Advantages

Ⅰ. Food waste can be utilized for resources
Well Create Co., Ltd. recycles a variety of food waste to compost.
We produce 80 tons of compost from 1300 tons of food waste per year.(Volume reduction through the dehydration and fermentation process)

Ⅱ. Manufacture of stable quality compost
The company can manufacture stable quality compost.
All produced compost can be purchased and consumed by local farmers.

Ⅲ. Simple operation method of the composting machine
Anyone can operate the machine after short training for about 2 weeks.

Ⅳ. No emit of bad odor in a composting center
Deodorized equipments are not necessary, since composting machines do not generate bad odor in the fermentation process.

Ⅴ. Two methods of composting
(1) The company collects food wastes and carries them to the composting center and produces compost.
(2) The company installs composting machines to hotels, restaurants, hospitals etc. These on-site machines are operated by clients. The company also collects primary fermented compost from those machines and carries it to the composting center, around once a month.

Technology Data

Possible Applications

In Japan, Well Create Co., Ltd. considers food waste discharged from food factories, food markets, hotels, restaurants, homes, etc. as resources, manufactures high-quality compost using composting machines and supplies it to farmers. Farmers can use compost to reduce chemical fertilizer and to cultivate crops, hence it is possible to produce safe and secure crops.

The company would like to build such a “recycling loop” even in developing countries for waste reduction and recycling, and produces safe and secure crops.

As a first step, we surveyed food waste composting in Cameron Highland City, Malaysia, in JICA ‘s project of “Feasibility Survey for food waste composting and creating of recycling loop” in 2018.

Continue to compile food waste composting in the same place in JICA’s project of “SDGs Business Verification Survey with the Private Sector for Food Waste Composting and Creating of Recycling Loop” in 2019.

Competitive Advantage

  1. Reduction and recycling of food waste
    By composting food wastes and reuse them, it is possible to reduce the amount of intermediate treatment and the final disposal sites, as well as food waste incineration which causes CO2 emission.

  2. High durability and good maintainability
    Since the composting machine has been developed over many years, it can maintain high durability. In addition, it has a characteristic of simple maintenance system by reducing the number of parts and types of parts with high general versatility.

  3. Low power consumption and energy saving
    Food waste is mixing at a slow speed in composting machine. Then the power consumption is less than normal machines and it can save energy.

  4. Possible to use local composting enzyme developed in the country
    In order to encourage decomposition and fermentation of food waste, composting enzyme is used. Although we use composting enzyme made in Japan at the beginning of operation, but we can positively examine the use of local composting enzyme if conditions are satisfied.

  5. Treatment of food wastes including high moisture, oil and fats, and salt
    Since the compost machine has a water sprinkler and dehydration mechanism, vegetable residue with high moisture content and food residue including salt and fat can be processed.

    Performance

    Compost is produced from food waste after 1 week of primary fermentation period and 2 months of secondary and thirdly fermentation period. Well Create Co., Ltd. treats 1,300 tons of food waste per year (4.5 tons per day), and produces 80 tons of compost per year and supply it to farmers.

    The compost machines will perform intermittent operation automatically 24/7 (24 hours 7 days). Power outage under 3days has no effect on composting. As the machines are continuous input type, it is unnecessary to take out the whole amount of the primary fermented matter for each treatment as in the batch type).
    Moreover, it has the strong point that you can select a composting machine according to the processing amount of food wastes on the user side.

    Technical maturity / Past record of introduction

    Well Create Co., Ltd. operates the composting center in Kitakyushu city and also sells composting machines to vegetable processing factories, government-operated wholesale markets, schools, and others.
    The composting center which has started operation in 2015 treats per year (4.5 tons per day), produces 80 tons of compost per year and supply it to farmers.
    The unit sales of composting machines are as follows.

    Table 1 The unit sales of composting machines

    Year

    Number of sold machines

    Cumulative number

    2014

    29

    420

    2015

    26

    446

    2016

    39

    485

    2017

    42

    527

    2018

    61

    588

    Information on patent related to this technology

    Title : The method of organic waste recycling
    Number of open to the public : Tokukai2018-145050
    Date of open to the public : 20th Sep. 2018

    Company Data

    Name Well Create Co., Ltd.
    Address 10-1, Koyo, Wakamatsu-ku, Kitakyushu-city, Fukuoka, 808-0002 JAPAN
    Capital 45 million yen (as of January 2019)
    Contact person

    Mr. Yasushi MATSUO
    ymatsuo@well-c.co.jp
    TEL +81-93-752-5300

    Number of employees 30 (as of April 2020)
    Date of company foundation 4th June, 2001
    Type of business

    Food waste recycling by Composting
    Food waste collection and transportation

     

    International operation

    Number of employees for international operation 

    Total number of employees : 5
    4 employees are in Japan
    1 employee is in China

      Overseas
           offices



    City, Country Name of Company (if applicable)
    Tsingtao City in China Tsingtao office of Well Create Co., Ltd.

    Modality of business transaction

    Direct Investment

    In Malaysia, we plan to create a local corporation by joint investment in Malaysia, to sell composting machines and to operate a composting center.

    Partnership

    In other countries, we would like to sell composting machines after concluding a partner contract with local companies.
    Also we would like to instruct the way to manage a composting center.

    Attachments

    Schematic illustration of the technology

                                         Fig 3. A practical case of food waste recycling in Kitakyushu ECO-Town

    Contact Person(s)

    Mr. Yasushi MATSUOE-mail: ymatsuo@well-c.co.jp

    *Please mention that you saw UNIDO's website when making the first contact with the company.

    Registered Category

    • Environmental Technologies : Waste treatment and management
    • Agribusiness Technologies : Production enhancement