Background Industrial wastewater is subject to environmental legislation and limits have been set on discharges based on whether they are sent directly to a sewer system or pass through a public river bed. While direct to sewer discharges are cheaper to treat, they incur higher charges (Annex III of the Council Directive 91/271/EEC concerning waste water treatment). If industries adopt more efficient means of treating wastewater and eliminate/reduce the generation of waste or by-products (such as sludge), then water cannon and operating costs would decrease substantially along with the impact on the environment. Objectives The main aim of the project is to further develop anaerobic membrane bioreactors (AnMBR), an emerging technology for the sustainable wastewater treatment of the agro-food sector. To achieve this aim, the project will construct an innovative and viable AnMBR wastewater treatment pilot plant that is specially adapted to the agro-food industry sector – i.e. it will offer an improved performance in treating wastewater with a high fat and oil content. This new technology also avoids problems linked to the treatment of wastewater with a high amount of organic matter, such as flotation of suspended biomass and the recollection of the biogas produced in digestion. The project team expects that this technology will be transferrable to scenarios where conventional anaerobic bioreactors are an inefficient means of treating wastewater. These include cases of excess salinity, large fluctuations in the concentration and composition of wastewater, and wastewater with abnormally high concentrations of nitrogen, among others. Expected results: Construction of a pilot plan with a treatment capacity higher than one cubic metre a day that can be transported and operated in situ on a pre-industrial scale to demonstrate the efficiency and viability of a wastewater treatment system based on AnMBR technology; Elimination of chemical reagent in the pre-treatment of wastewater (current standard practice for treating wastewater from a snacks factory is to add 0.5-1 kg coagulant PCBA type, 0.01-0.05 kg floculant poliacrilamide type and 0.1- 0.2 kg NaOH per m3 of treated water); Reduction of more than 90% of sludge produced in the physical-chemical pre-treatment of water depending on water characteristics; and Use of 100% of the oil and grease from wastewater to produce biogas with a methane concentration of 60-70%. Reduction in respective greenhouse gas emissions of 0.72 – 0.9 kg CO2 per kg of organic matter treated.