He is director of the “New Products, New Services” department. He joined ECT in September 2019. As such, he is at the heart of the company’s innovative approach and the marketing of ECT’s fertile substrate, Urbafertil.

How did Urbafertil come about?

Urbafertil has a long history. The interactions between our inert soil developments and soil fertilization are rapidly becoming one of the major issues in our development activity.

As early as 2002, ECT was present when certain parts of the Parc de la Courneuve were revegetated with a mixture of excavated earth and compost. The experiment is monitored and supported by the Conseil départemental de Seine-Saint-Denis.

Between 2002 and 2013, ECT will be associated with a scientific committee on fertile substrate, including members from ADEME, the Conservatoire Botanique National du Bassin Parisien, INRA, the UMR Biogéochimie et Ecologie des Milieux Continentaux, the Université Paris Est and the Bioemco laboratory.

The work of this scientific committee will lead to a 4-year experimental phase (2013 -2017). This experiment is taking place at the ECT site in Villeneuve-sous-Dammartin (77).

It will be scientifically monitored by Charlotte Pruvost, a doctoral student at the Institut d’Ecologie et des Sciences de l’Environnement in Paris. His thesis is entitled: “The potential of biodiversity in the construction of technosols from urban waste”.

This thesis will be defended in December 2018 before a jury made up of members of the Muséum national d’histoire naturelle, lecturers at the University of Lorraine and professors from the Universities of Rouen and Dijon.

In 2019, ECT is creating a Research and Development department. Building on previous experiments, one of the department’s missions is to produce and market a fertile substrate. This production is carried out in close collaboration with Biodepe, an ECT subsidiary specializing in organic waste and soil fertilization. So in December 2019, ECT can boost this approach, by offering local authorities its own brand of fertile substrate: Urbafertil.

Why use Urbafertil as a growing medium?

Nowadays, when local authorities design revegetation projects, they usually import topsoil. This soil comes from the stripping of fields outside the towns. They are then transported to their place of use, even though local, recycled, high-performance solutions are available. That’s why it’s important to think differently and give priority to local products.

The traceability of topsoil is not always optimal. Urbafertil is composed of inert soil from construction sites located near the site to be revegetated. This inert soil benefits from the compulsory traceability of excavated soil.

Urbafertil is a pure recycling product, derived from the combined reuse of inert soil and green waste compost. Urbafertil is a successful example of the circular economy, with prices extremely competitive with those of topsoil.

A number of Urbafertil growing media projects are currently underway in the Paris region.

What new products or services are you working on?

The challenge for ECT’s R&D department and its “new products and new services” division is to generalize a forward-looking, innovative approach. ECT is committed to this innovative approach, and has also forged partnerships with innovative companies. To offer local authorities a range of new products and services to meet their planning and development needs.

This has already led to the launch of the Urbafertil substrate, as well as membership of Cycle Terre. The aim of this association is to create a channel for reusing inert soil from the construction industry to build new neighborhoods in raw earth.

Last but not least, we are also keenly aware of the environmental and social impacts of the developments we carry out. We are therefore aware of their potential and their ability to have an extremely positive impact in the medium and long term. ECT is currently working on tools to enhance the value of our solutions from an environmental point of view, and thus demonstrate their advantage over other solutions.