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Landspreading

Landspreading is a practice that is as old as agriculture itself. Its purpose is to return to the soil some of the organic matter and fertilizing elements that crops remove.

Preliminary studies
Operation
Biosolid Spreading Monitoring
What is landspreading ?
Agricultural benefit of industrial and urban by-products

Preliminary studies

A preliminary study is carried out to determine the suitability of the landbank for spreading and to validate the agricultural properties of industrial and urban by-products.

Sensitive areas are excluded (e.g. near water abstraction point or river).
Each plot of land is studied and recorded.
Soils are analyzed before spreading to assess their needs and check on their suitability for spreading.

Preliminary studies include the following services

Product analysis

Quantitative and qualitative production balance
Determination of product's fertilizing value
Sizing of required landbank

Creation of the landbank

Contacting farmers
Study of suitability of plots

Technical-economic study assesment

Development of a reliable and long-term viable organization
Presentation of resources to be implemented (storage, transport, spreaders)
Investment and operation costs

Administrative aspects

License
Permit

Communication services

Partner information
Transparency of the recovery solution
Support for any type of contact

Operation

Transport, storage, spreading, SEDE Environnement commits oneself towards its customers and proposes operation management in the frame of long term contracts.

Agronomical advices and relationship with farmers

Farmers are provided with personalized information and agronomical advices specific to their lands.

This provides the optimum integration of the sludge and by-products in their Nutrient Management Plan. Spreading rates are determined taking into account plant needs, the quantities of fertilizing elements released from the sludge and from of the soil. Additional fertilization provided by the farmer is planned, if necessary.

Monitoring

The sludge and by-products are analyzed regularly. Soils are analyzed prior to spreading, to verify their suitability to receive the sludge and by-products.

Biosolid Spreading Monitoring

SEDE Environnement's team of agronomists works permanently alongside farmers. They provide tracking and -monitoring of spreading through provisional planning, a spreading register and Nutrient Management Plan, as well as updating of the data integrated in the preliminary studies.

Transparency and traceability

Farmers and the local authorities receive all of the analytical information relative to soils and to the by-products spreaded on land. All of the spreading data are recorded and then processed with the SUIVRA software.

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What is landspreading ?

The organic matter cycle
Landspreading is a practice that is as old as agriculture itself. Its purpose is to return to the soil some of the organic matter and fertilizing elements that crops remove.

Water treatment and sludge production
Before it is released back into the natural environment, the water we use has to be treated. The biological processes used during treatment removes the organic pollution present in the water. In fact, these treatments reproduce and amplify the natural processes of biodegradation. The sludge produced by this treatment contains organic matter, nitrogen, phosphorus and trace elements. Its quality is regularly checked by accredited laboraty. Therefore they can be used as substitutes for mineral fertilizers to maintain soil potential and encourage plant growth.

Returning fertilizing elements to the soil

Agricultural benefit of industrial and urban by-products

A pre-requisite for landspreading

The basic principle underlying landspreading of sludge and by-products from industry and communities is that they must be beneficial to agriculture.

Properties of sludge and by-products

The sludge and by-products are rich in organic matter (45-80% of dry solid) that stimulates the biological activity of the soil. They provide nitrogen (5% of dry solid on average) and phosphorous (between 4 and 10%), with a currently upward trend as a result of the development of treatments removing phosphorous. Limed sludge are also rich in calcium, preventing soils from becoming acid.

Composted sludge contributes to maintaining the level of humus in the soil which, amongst other things, improves water retention and attenuates soil erosion and ravining.

Outlets for the different products depend on their properties and on their dry matter content : cakes or solids, liquids , composts.