A visit to a circular innovation hub in Norway
As part of the Hort2thefuture project, Vlaco visited The Magic Factory, an innovative Norwegian facility that transforms food waste into fertiliser and compost. Located in Sem, the plant is leading the way in circular food production by turning everyday biowaste into nutrients for growing tomatoes.
What is The Magic Factory?
The Magic Factory is a large-scale anaerobic digestion plant co-owned by Lindum and Greve Biogass, two eastern Norwegian companies backed by local authorities. Every year, the facility processes around 70,000 tonnes of food waste collected from 1.2 million people. This is combined with industrial liquid waste and manure, then treated through a complex process to create valuable by-products like biofertiliser, compost, and biogas.
The food waste is shredded, filtered, and separated into a slurry and solid reject. The slurry is cleaned and thickened before undergoing a 30-day digestion process. The result is a nutrient-rich liquid fertiliser and a fibre product. The liquid is stored in satellite tanks for use on farms, while the fibre is treated further, sometimes through composting.
Research to improve waste treatment
The Magic Factory is investing heavily in research and development to improve its systems. One area of focus is finding better ways to remove plastics and impurities from food waste. Another is exploring pyrolysis as a more sustainable way to treat reject materials. The team is also looking at new ways to purify the liquid fertiliser, possibly using the heat generated by pyrolysis.
The plant produces biogas from the digestion process, which is upgraded to biomethane. Currently, the carbon dioxide by-product is used in greenhouses, but the team is exploring options for capturing purer CO2 for use in food production and industry.
Compost-powered tomatoes
The factory works closely with Reklima, a company that uses the biofertiliser in its greenhouses. At a separate site, the fibre from the digestion process is dried and mixed with green waste, papermill residues, and clay. This blend is then composted using earthworms in a method known as vermicomposting. The resulting substrate is used to grow tomatoes in a trial greenhouse setup.
Earthworms help transform the nitrogen in the compost into plant-available nutrients, which are boosted by liquid fertiliser from The Magic Factory. Special spray nozzles ensure an even distribution of nutrients across the greenhouse. The tomatoes are reported to be delicious, but yields remain low, and there is not yet a strong marketing system in place. Reklima hopes that with the right support, this model can be scaled up and made commercially viable.
Powering buses and educating future generations
The Magic Factory recycles over 110,000 tonnes of digestate each year. Most of it is returned to farms as fertiliser, while the biogas is turned into biomethane and sold for use in buses, garbage trucks, and ships. Some of it is even liquefied for marine transport.
Beyond technology, The Magic Factory is known for its strong educational focus. Every schoolchild in the region visits the plant to learn about biowaste, selective collection, and the journey from food waste to fertiliser. With interactive exhibits, games, and hands-on activities, the plant’s educational centre is helping to build a new generation of environmentally aware citizens.
More information: https://vimeo.com/528786043/567e7cf549