How do you get fertilizer from industrial waste?

[Walta Gaming]

I have spent over an hour on this wreched system, rebuilt and redesigned my dumps several times and still the system seems broken. I have watched videos on it and still it does not make sense as to why it's not working.

https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198119628527/screenshot/2295211542937773644/

This is what I have. The basic idea is the cattle farms produce biological waste which turns into fertiliser. However, the dumps have turned into mixed waste and I can't reset it to biological waste. The stupid waste transfer station does not even work so it takes ages for any of the mixed waste to be cleared. I have tried emptying the dumps several times but when I do a bit of other waste gets mixed in which causes the dumps to store mixed waste before I can check the box to only store biological waste.

I am at a loss as to why fertiliser is not moving along the factory connection into the bins that are set to store fertiliser. It's just stuck in the mixed waste dump and my trucks can't pick any of it up. I guess the last resort is to turn off realistic mode and delete / rebuild the dumps before any other waste can slip in. No way I am going to wait for 50 tones of waste to be picked up manually for a 3rd time. It's an extremely annoying system I have put my game on hold for a week just trying different ways of getting this farm setup to work. Without it my large farm is stuck without any fertiliser.

[Delle(DK)]

I think there is a small X button that allow you to empty your storage ( i think ) some buildings and vehicles have it some do not.
put the game on pause and empty the storage and select what kind of stuff it should put in the storage. Alternative destroy the factory connection, empty and then configure what to collect. beforre you rebuild the factory connection.

I did not try to have a cattle farm my self with the garbage system.
But i know that in my city i am using the big containers and allow people to sort their stuff and one of the things are biological waste.
my garbage trucks then dump that directly into my composting factory that make it into solid fertilizer that i can then drive to my farm.
I output to an storage with a claw and then my train pickup example 100t and drive it to my farms.
I recommend the composting factory.
its a little hard to see, but i think its on the "page" with the factory that can burn waste, just mouse over and it should show you the composting factory.

tip, the composting factory only have one factory connection, so maybe use the forklift system so you can connect directly to the cow farm and to the storage at the same time.
You can also connect several forklift garages together so you can connect both of your farms to it ect.

ps., you properbly did so but configure your garbage containers to collect biological waste by default they only collect mixed waste.

[Walta Gaming]

Originally posted by Delle(DK):

I think there is a small X button that allow you to empty your storage ( i think ) some buildings and vehicles have it some do not.
put the game on pause and empty the storage and select what kind of stuff it should put in the storage. Alternative destroy the factory connection, empty and then configure what to collect. beforre you rebuild the factory connection.

I did not try to have a cattle farm my self with the garbage system.
But i know that in my city i am using the big containers and allow people to sort their stuff and one of the things are biological waste.
my garbage trucks then dump that directly into my composting factory that make it into solid fertilizer that i can then drive to my farm.
I output to an storage with a claw and then my train pickup example 100t and drive it to my farms.
I recommend the composting factory.
its a little hard to see, but i think its on the "page" with the factory that can burn waste, just mouse over and it should show you the composting factory.

tip, the composting factory only have one factory connection, so maybe use the forklift system so you can connect directly to the cow farm and to the storage at the same time.
You can also connect several forklift garages together so you can connect both of your farms to it ect.

ps., you properbly did so but configure your garbage containers to collect biological waste by default they only collect mixed waste.

You cannot clear storages / vehicles of materials that have a negative value so the only way to get rid of it is to truck it away. Yea I think I am just going to have to rebuild everything again in cheat mode because I don't have patience to reset it for a 3rd time in realistic mode.

I am not a fan of the composting factory since the output can easily get filled up which causes trucks with biological waste to get stuck. Forklifts cannot move waste so you need a truck to do it. Really wish the composting factory had an output connection so it would not get filled up so fast. Only option is to export the fertiliser which seems like a waste of chemicals since they cost much more then you can sell fertiliser for.

Garbage containers are configured and trucks dump it into the dump by the livestock farm.

Ugh what a pain. I guess the only way is to set the dump by the livestock farm to biological before anything happens or you are screwed.

[Silent_Shadow]

You can clear dumps and then switch their type to biological waste only, or you can designate dumpsters in a stand to biological waste.

[Sirius Czech]

Easy fix for you, my friend - scrap that dump + storage containers and build standard large containers for technical services and designate them to how many of them will be for biowaste/fertilizer (you cannot divide these two). Rest of the mixed waste will sort automatically to "mixed waste "containers.

Alternatively just scrap the dump, build the storage, but then you need a DO/direct line to take it out. Save yourself the hassle.

Biowaste/fertiliser can be trucked
a) to a dump (ideally attached to a farm already) for biowaste only, where it will slowly rot into fertiliser and farm will pull fertiliser from it as well (good starter setup)

b) to a composting plant, where biowaste can be turned into fertiliser immediately while consuming a tiny bit of chemicals (good mid-late game setup)

c) to a "composting bioreactor yard" if you are playing some silly challenge like my Husák challenge so you cannot import chemicals for your farms (if you want to export the product at least), do you just build a big container storage in a free space and 3-5 large dumps with claw. You let every technical service truck biowaste to that storage. Then you have small DO with few trucks assigned to pick that biowaste and spread it evenly to all those dumps and also have it set to load fertiliser from them and put into last one on the side; this only dump will not be biowaste, but willbe fertiliser only and will serve as an intermediate storage; fertiliser dump will be both set to "unload fertiliser 100%" and "load fertiliser 5%" and then the same DO will have it´s own task to supply every farm in surrounding 4 km range with 100% bio fertiliser that WILL emerge from this setup.

Yes, DO (and farms and lines) can load fertiliser from biowaste, but only when it is there 30% or higher % ;)

Hope this helps ;)

[Sirius Czech]

Bioreactor in full swing see here (missing those containers storage for biowaste as an input, that is a tip I have gotten later on)
https://youtu.be/1V1_Y-PHW-g?si=HomJ-WWkdzjB90LQ&t=1381

[Walta Gaming]

Originally posted by jan.mitiska:

Easy fix for you, my friend - scrap that dump + storage containers and build standard large containers for technical services and designate them to how many of them will be for biowaste/fertilizer (you cannot divide these two). Rest of the mixed waste will sort automatically to "mixed waste "containers.

Alternatively just scrap the dump, build the storage, but then you need a DO/direct line to take it out. Save yourself the hassle.

Biowaste/fertiliser can be trucked
a) to a dump (ideally attached to a farm already) for biowaste only, where it will slowly rot into fertiliser and farm will pull fertiliser from it as well (good starter setup)

b) to a composting plant, where biowaste can be turned into fertiliser immediately while consuming a tiny bit of chemicals (good mid-late game setup)

c) to a "composting bioreactor yard" if you are playing some silly challenge like my Husák challenge so you cannot import chemicals for your farms (if you want to export the product at least), do you just build a big container storage in a free space and 3-5 large dumps with claw. You let every technical service truck biowaste to that storage. Then you have small DO with few trucks assigned to pick that biowaste and spread it evenly to all those dumps and also have it set to load fertiliser from them and put into last one on the side; this only dump will not be biowaste, but willbe fertiliser only and will serve as an intermediate storage; fertiliser dump will be both set to "unload fertiliser 100%" and "load fertiliser 5%" and then the same DO will have it´s own task to supply every farm in surrounding 4 km range with 100% bio fertiliser that WILL emerge from this setup.

Yes, DO (and farms and lines) can load fertiliser from biowaste, but only when it is there 30% or higher % ;)

Hope this helps ;)

There is some good info here I will try some of this. Sounds like the free way of creating fertiliser kind of sucks since you have to attach it to a farm. With the amount of waste coming out of the cattle farms it's a waste of vehicles to try and pick up all that waste and move it over to a farm with the super low loading speed. Would be much nicer if the fertiliser would be moved to a container transfer so you don't have to spend forever loading it onto trucks.

[Sirius Czech]

Originally posted by Walta Gaming:

There is some good info here I will try some of this. Sounds like the free way of creating fertiliser kind of sucks since you have to attach it to a farm. With the amount of waste coming out of the cattle farms it's a waste of vehicles to try and pick up all that waste and move it over to a farm with the super low loading speed. Would be much nicer if the fertiliser would be moved to a container transfer so you don't have to spend forever loading it onto trucks.

Standard fertiliser/biowaste moves "wirelessly" over to the near containers (those with white symbols in pictures, not storages!). If and how will you make fertiliser of it all is then up to you and you obviously need to truck it there, but pickup point is those containers and usually it is automatic due to TS having it as it´s job. The only thing you assing is a dropoff point for it.

Easiest thing is
- container stands with large containers near food/meat/alcohol production (as well as in the city near stores, hotels and so on...)
- sort directly in them (industries even do not need research for it to work)
- assign TS a correct dropoff spot, which might as well be
- composting plant and it´s attached containers for biowaste only (set the factory connection as one-way and drop into those contaners)
- then set a DO with large waste trucks to pickup directly from the building and truck
a) waste to where you want it (separation/incinerator/customs)
b) fertiliser to farms/farm dums/customs (to sell excess amounts)

Boom, there you go, set for the whole game.

[Walta Gaming]

I got it working with a few garbage trucks and a fertiliser factory. The issue now is I produce too much fertiliser. In less then a year a 97 ton dump and the farm were both filled to capacity. It's taking up 4 waste trucks just to sell all the excess fertiliser which is certainly not worth the tinny amount of profit I get for selling the fertiliser.

I also hope we get a "notify me when dump is full" check box so we don't have to manually check the waste system to see if anything got jammed. When my fertiliser factory got jammed my city garbage trucks got stuck which could have led to a disaster even though there was no notification anything was wrong. There just would have been a notification saying citizen health is too low but by that time it would be way to late to prevent thousands from dying to overfilled garbages.

[Silent_Shadow]

I just employ an "overflow" method for making fertilizer; basically I send biological waste into dumps (for conversion into fertilizer) until they are full, and burn the rest of the biological waste (burning biological waste produces a lot less ash than burning fertilizer).

I find overflow set ups work best for keeping waste moving because even if one part gets disabled, other parts will still work and you can have notifications for the broken parts (like notify me if facility stops working, traffic jam notifications, etc.) and periodic quick checks with the list for vehicles and buildings should cover the rest. The alert system could use an overhaul though.