No longer able to feed meat-and-bone meal (MBM) to farm animals, British researchers are assessing its potential as a construction material.

The Meat and Livestock Commission has asked engineers at the Building Research Establishment (BRE) in Watford, near London, to investigate whether ash from incinerated MBM can be mixed into concrete and used to fill holes, lay roads and even build houses.

About 2.5 million tonnes of MBM are produced in Europe each year as a by-product of the meat trade. MBM was used in animal feed in Britain until 1996, when the practice was banned because the feed was thought to be playing a role in the spread of mad-cow disease.

Slaughterhouses are now left with mountains of animal leftovers that they currently incinerate and pay to dump as landfill.
from Nature