The initiative ‘Hydrothermal hydrolysis for agro-industrial biogas plants, Hidroterm’ investigates the integration of this technique as a pre-treatment to improve the efficiency of anaerobic digestion. It also studies the conversion of slurry and agricultural waste into renewable energy and high quality biofertilisers, and the development of circular economy strategies to enhance nutrient recovery and carbon capture. 

Sorigué's partners in this project are Torre Santamaria, Muns Agroindustrial, the Institute of Agri-Food Research and Technology, IRTA, and the Bioenergy Cluster Association of Catalonia. 

Hidroterm is aligned with the EU's climate targets to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050 and strengthen the economic resilience of the agro-industrial sector. 

The HarvRESt project aims to integrate on-farm renewable energy sources to improve sustainable energy production and promote the decarbonisation of the primary sector.

Specifically, this project will develop an Agricultural Virtual Power Plant (AVPP) and a Decision Support System (DSS) to optimise the use of renewable energy sources on farms. The initiative aims to make farms climate neutral, optimise their production and reduce their environmental impact.
 
Currently, this project is monitoring four cases, in Spain, Norway, Denmark and Italy. From the Noguera Renovables facilities, Sorigué's Innovation Department collects data from its biomethane plant to model the production of biogas from agricultural waste. This study also evaluates the fertiliser potential of the recovered nutrients, in order to increase the circularity of the farm and diversify its income. 
 
The project is funded by the European Commission through the ‘Horizon Europe’ programme, has 14 collaborating partners in Europe and is coordinated by the CIRCE technology research centre.

With the entry into force of the new Law on Waste and Contaminated Land, no more than 50% of plastic waste can be sent to landfill, so the Despoliplast project proposes the development of a catalytic depolymerisation technology for the transformation of plastics into fuel based on recycled carbon and hydrogen.

In the first phase (between 2023 and 2024), the project focused on waste characterisation and the design and construction of the technology on a pilot scale. Its extension, until September 2025, allows the technology to be further validated in a plant built at the Noguera Renovables facilities. The behaviour of the two materials tested in the laboratory will be analysed: plastic waste from car scrapping, provided by CELSA, and plastic fractions from reverse osmosis membranes, provided by Ecomemb. 

With Despoliplast it is hoped to obtain a high quality recycled carbon fuel with which the feasibility of reforming it into hydrogen can be studied. Sorigué coordinates the project in which AMIC - Aplicacions Mediambientals i Industrials de la Catàlisi, from the Universitat Rovira i Virgili, also participates.

Despoliplast is financed by the ‘Nuclis de I+D’ grant line for climate change projects of ACCIÓ, the Agency for Business Competitiveness of the Generalitat de Catalunya, with a total budget of 233,318.60€.

The VAL2H2 project, coordinated by Sorigué, represents a technological advance in the entire H2 value chain, because it not only studies the production of renewable H2 from biowaste, but also its possible use as a fuel. This research is financed by the European Commission with Next Generation Funds. At the state level, the funding is articulated through the H2 PERTE, within the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan of the Ministry for Ecological Transformation and the Demographic Challenge. 

The project will test novel technologies on a pilot plant scale at the Noguera Renovables facilities, laboratory tests and simulations with specialised software.

One of the strengths of the project is its collaborative nature, as the work is carried out in a consortium between six entities: Sorigué (coordinator), Indox Energy Systems, IREC (Catalonia Institute for Energy Research), CIEMAT (Centre for Energy, Environmental and Technological Research), EURECAT and URV (Rovira i Virgili University). 

The VAL2H2 project addresses the problem of managing waste such as pruning waste from the maintenance of urban parks and gardens, developing technological routes that will allow its recovery in the form of H2. The tests will include gasification and alcoholic fermentation technologies, followed by low-temperature catalytic reforming. 

Regarding storage, simulations will be carried out with specialised software, as well as experimental studies with a prototype to evaluate different pressure and temperature conditions. Finally, new methodologies for the analysis of flue gases and the quality of H2 produced will be studied, and studies will be carried out with fuel cells as a specific case of H2 conversion into electricity.

Life Biodaph20 is a demonstration project to scale up an eco-efficient tertiary wastewater treatment system based on natural processes in Spain and Greece.

The demonstration plants will produce reused water that will contribute to reducing the discharge of pollutants into aquatic ecosystems and promote the reuse of water for agricultural purposes. The Biodaph system was previously developed within the Innoqua project (GA 689817) and is based on the purification capacity of different biological organisms: Daphnia, microalgae and biofilms, to remove pollutants from water (nutrients, organic matter, pathogens, heavy metals, emerging and priority pollutants).

This compact and energy-efficient system produces a minimum amount of sludge and does not require chemical reagents in its operation. The implementation of this system at the Quart WWTP (Girona, Spain) will reduce the impact of discharges into the Onyar river and improve the quality of the aquatic ecosystems in the area.

The Life Biodaph20 project began in August 2022 and is funded under the Life programme, the European Commission's only financial instrument devoted entirely to environmental protection and climate action. The project is coordinated by the University of Girona and involves Sorigué, the water cluster CWP (Catalan Water Partnership), the CSIC (Spanish National Research Council), the Balmes University Foundation (UVIC-UCC), Minavra Techniki and the NTUA (National Technical University of Athens). 

This project studies and evaluates the recovery of sludge produced at drinking water treatment plants by using it as a substitute for raw materials in the industrial sector. Its aim is to incorporate the sludge into the production chain, giving it a high added value for a wide range of applications.

A study is being carried out to characterise the purification sludge and evaluate the different possibilities for use in the construction and cement industries. It is hoped that the material can be used as a partial replacement for some raw materials, which would help to reduce the carbon footprint and to reduce energy and natural resource consumption, as well as increase the service life of quarries.

Its application in the production of zeolitic materials (microporous aluminosilicate mineral) by thermal activation treatment is also being evaluated. The most promising technological solution will be complemented by a technical, economic and environmental feasibility analysis to ensure its industrial application.

This research seeks new opportunities for recovery in line with the principle of the waste treatment hierarchy established in the European Union in Directive 2008/98/EC, which will lead to a series of environmental benefits derived from the use of materials that are primarily destined for landfill or use as land conditioning.

The Lloval project has been developed by Nordvert, the Sorigué company specialising in waste management, with the support of the group's innovation department. It applied to the Catalan Waste Agency (ARC) 2019 call for projects promoting the circular economy and was awarded the maximum grant requested by the ARC, as well as being supported by the Government of Catalonia’s Agency for Business Competitiveness, ACCIÓ.

The Water Harmony project is a collaborative project aiming to close the water cycle gap by harmonising global best practices, implementing smart and healthy water management concepts that address emerging challenges and mobilise stakeholders.

Within the framework of this project, Sorigué and Leitat are researching nanofibre synthesis using the "electrospinning" technique with the aim of retaining and eliminating different types of pollutants from wastewater (pathogens, heavy metals, microplastics and pharmaceutical products) by means of a highly permeable and therefore energy-efficient system. The selectivity of the technology will make it possible to obtain different effluent qualities focused on the reuse of water for agricultural and domestic use.

In the course of this research, a water quality characterisation study has also been carried out with respect to microplastics at different stages of treatment. This study, carried out jointly with the TecnATox group at Rovira i Virgili University, aims to evaluate the effectiveness of different water treatments in eliminating microplastics.

The research is part of an international WaterWorks 2017 ERA-NET Co-fund project comprising 12 European partners, as well as Chinese, American, Australian and Singaporean partners, all led by the Norwegian University of Life Sciences in a project worth approximately €2 million. Specifically, Sorigué has CDTI funding with a budget of €423,857 and a grant of €169,542.

CLD, a Sorigué-owned cleaning and waste management company, seeks to optimize PV and grid energy resources and consumption through the application of a digital twin system and IoT-based technologies.

The main objective of Genius is to develop a complete digital twin integrated into a cloud-based IoT platform for advanced process monitoring and control, energy optimization for charging, management of electrical resources involving PV and grid energy, carbon footprint tracking, and dynamic energy economic analysis in urban environments.

This will maximize the synergies between local renewable energy generation and the electric vehicle fleet, leading to the complete decarbonization of the entire value chain at CLD.

The project partners are the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC), CLD, NVISION Systems and Technologies, and the Energy Research Institute of Catalonia (IREC). Genius is a public-private partnership R&D&I project within the state's R&D&I program, focused on societal challenges, within the framework of the State Plan for Scientific, Technical, and Innovation 2017-2020. It is funded by the EU's Next Generation funds.

Research and development of new technology to make the process of removing organic matter from wastewater more efficient, while simultaneously retrieving electrical energy.

The goal is to improve the performance of wetland systems, creating a competitive advantage for the business in the wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) market.

This research aims to perfect wetland systems through incorporative bioelectrochemical systems in order to make the processes of removing organic material more efficient, while simultaneously seeking to retrieve electrical energy so that it can be reused to monitor the entire process.

This project is co-financed by the European Union’s European Regional Development Fund within the framework of the ERDF Operational Program for Catalonia 2014-2020, with a subsidy of €98,830.20. Thematic goal: To promote technological development, innovation and quality research.

Research into new technologies to manage the water cycle in tourist facilities in an intelligent and sustainable way. This research aims to develop innovative technologies to optimize and provide higher intelligence to the main points of water consumption and purification, primarily in the recreational area and in the different treatment systems that exist in a hotel facility.

The project seeks to apply advanced technology to grey-water treatment—waste water that comes from domestic use such as washing clothes or dishes, as well as bath water—through the implementation of a wetland with a vertical wall configuration and bioelectrochemical technology to generate energy.

This project is co-financed by the European Union’s European Regional Development Fund within the framework of the ERDF Operational Program for Catalonia 2014-2020, with a subsidy of €516,776.40 for the entire project, €44,045.95 of which has been allocated to Sorigué. Thematic goal: To promote technological development, innovation and quality research.

Both projects are developed in collaboration with the Leitat technological center and have been subsidized by the ACC1Ó agency, which promotes business competition in the Generalitat of Catalonia through the European Regional Development Fund within the framework of the ERDF Operational Program for Catalonia 2014-2020.