Cyprus SME converting agricultural waste — poultry feathers and industrial residues — into ceramic water-treatment membranes and bioeconomy materials.
Atlantis Environment & Innovation is a Cyprus-based environmental consulting SME whose real-world work centres on turning agricultural and industrial waste streams into value-added products. In REMEB they contributed to commercialising eco-friendly ceramic membrane bioreactors — membranes made from recycled agro-industrial waste — for industrial wastewater treatment and water reuse in water-scarce regions. In UNLOCK they extended that waste-valorisation logic into the bioeconomy, supporting the conversion of poultry feathers into keratin-based functional proteins and biodegradable plastics. Their participation in Innovation Action projects (focused on market replication and impact) signals that they are not a pure research body but a consultancy-type actor that bridges technical development and market introduction.
Both REMEB and UNLOCK are built around converting waste by-products — ceramic precursors from agro-industrial residues and poultry feathers — into usable materials, forming the consistent thread across their entire H2020 record.
REMEB (2015–2018) involved developing low-cost ceramic MBRs from recycled wastes for water reuse in water-scarce markets, with explicit focus on market replication.
UNLOCK (2021–2025) positions them in the poultry-waste bioeconomy, specifically keratin extraction for functional proteins and biodegradable plastics.
The keyword 'market replication and impact' in REMEB, combined with their Innovation Action participation and consultancy identity, suggests a recurring role in go-to-market and dissemination activities.
In their first H2020 project (REMEB, 2015–2018) the focus was tightly on water infrastructure: low-cost ceramic membranes fabricated from recycled agricultural waste, deployed in membrane bioreactors to address industrial wastewater treatment and water scarcity. By 2021, with UNLOCK, the domain shifted away from water entirely toward dry agro-industrial waste — specifically poultry feathers — and their conversion into keratin proteins and biodegradable bioplastics. The underlying logic is consistent (waste-in, value-out), but the application has moved upstream from environmental remediation into circular bioeconomy and biobased materials, reflecting a broader European policy and funding trend toward bio-based products.
They are moving from waste-based environmental engineering toward biobased materials and circular bioeconomy applications, which aligns with growing EU funding in the bio-based sector and suggests potential future involvement in bioplastics, protein valorisation, or sustainable packaging projects.
Atlantis has never coordinated an H2020 project, always participating as a consortium member or third party — a pattern consistent with a specialist consultancy that contributes defined expertise rather than managing full projects. Their 27 unique partners from 11 countries across just two projects is high, indicating they join large, multi-partner Innovation Action consortia rather than small focused teams. The third-party role in UNLOCK (no direct EC funding) further suggests they are sometimes brought in for specific advisory or dissemination capacity, which is typical of market-facing consultancies embedded in research-led consortia.
With 27 unique consortium partners across 11 countries from only two projects, Atlantis has exposure to a broad European network despite limited project volume — both projects were large Innovation Actions with wide consortia. No evidence of repeated partners suggests they enter new networks with each project rather than working within a fixed circle.
Atlantis occupies a narrow but coherent niche: agricultural waste valorisation spanning both environmental engineering (water treatment membranes) and emerging bioeconomy (feather-to-keratin), which few Cyprus-based SMEs can claim. As a private environmental consultancy in a water-stressed Mediterranean country, they bring direct regional relevance to water reuse and circular economy applications that affect Southern and Eastern European markets. For a consortium seeking a market-oriented SME partner with genuine hands-on experience in both waste-to-material conversion and commercial deployment, they represent a credible, non-academic anchor in the Cyprus / Eastern Mediterranean region.
