English
EnglishIn this toolkit students are working on a method to remove and recover phosphate from (waste)water. As our demand for food is increasing, so is the demand for fertilizers. Plants need phosphate to grow, and so the fertilizers must contain phosphate. Right now calciumphosphate is mined from mines outside of Europe. The mines are depleting and so this could cause a problem for Europe if these countries decide to stop the export of this phosphate. And so we need to focus on ways to recover phosphate and work on a circular economy.
Besides this, there is another problem with phosphate: Humans use the phosphate in plants as a nutrient for e.g. bones and DNA. A part of the phosphate we eat, ends up in our urine and eventually at the Waste Water Treatment Plants. Here large part of the phosphate is removed, but not all of it. The rest of phosphate ends up in our surface water and can cause eutrophication.
