21/10/20 - Making products from agri-waste and a mast year in our woodlands.

The rendering industry in the UK processes around 2.5 million tonnes of animal by-products each year. The waste includes things like livestock that have died on farms and the bits of animals we don't eat, and it has to be handled carefully and processed to avoid spreading disease. We visit a rendering plant which processes thousands of tonnes of poultry by-products like feet and feathers.

Waste from plants is easier to deal with, since it generally poses less of a disease risk. We hear from one company that is using left over grain from distilleries to make a resin, which can be mixed with various types of plant based by-products to make a composite material a bit like MDF. The company - called Cambond - has made various prototypes and is now hoping to scale up production in the UK, using by-products like the leaves and cobs left over from maize.

And autumn is here, but this year it's a bit special. It’s known as a ‘mast’ year when beech, oak and chestnut trees ALL produce a mega-crop of seed. It’s not known exactly how these trees act together, but often it can be triggered by the weather. The huge amount of food produced means wildlife is not able to eat all the seed and the trees have a better chance of reproducing successfully.

Presented by Anna Hill
Produced for BBC Audio in Bristol by Heather Simons