As the food bowl of Australia, regional agricultural communities are under pressure to adapt to changing climates. Combined with the enormous input costs of food production and waste management requirements, the strain is already being felt. 

The input costs of food production include purchasing and transportation costs of energy and fertilisers, and waste removal and management. Currently, many of these imported inputs generate income without any direct benefit to the community. CLEAN Cowra plans to create a circular economy, benefitting the local and regional community.

The below process diagram depicts the proposed system for creating a circular economy through the aggregation (1) of biomass resource and processing (2) and converting the aggregated biomass into commodities, such as distributed energy (4) and bio-products.

This is to be achieved through two processes (3), the first being anaerobic digestion and the second thermal recovery (through pyrolysis or torrefication).