UPM Contingency plan is underway
A new installation of Green Floating Filters (GFF) has been already implemented at the facilities of the Technical University of Madrid (Spain) in order to minimize the impact of covid-19 lockdown on the LIFE Biomass C+ project. The challenge addressed was to replace part of the trials that had to be halted at El Arenal due to that contingency, so that cattail biomass supply can continue for bioconversion to ethanol. The installation simulates a constructed wetland of cattails grown as floating plants with the help of ad-hoc floating sheets. It was constructed by excavating five basins with a length-to-width ratio of 10. The bottom of the basin was leveled and compacted prior to roll out white plain geotextile fabric, and over the geotextile fabric, polyethylene film to seal the basin. Planting was ended on 1 July.
Image 1: Rolling out plain geotextile fabric on a basin Image 2: Detail of floating supports and cattails just planted
Image 3: View of the just-planted wetland