On July 11, 2023, the Institute of Applied Ecology (IAE) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and Jiangsu New-Century Jiangnan Environmental Protection Company (NJEP) signed a comprehensive strategic cooperation agreement in Nanjing. The signing ceremony was attended by LUO Jing, the chairman of NJEP, as well as its vice president, chief engineer, and dean of its research institute. ZHUO Junchen, the deputy director of IAE, and WU Zhijie, a research scientist at IAE, were also present.

NJEP is a high-tech enterprise that provides integrated solutions for energy saving, pollution reduction, and carbon emission control for various industries. The company has independently developed its own carbon capture technology that tackles the major technical challenge of CO2 emissions from power plants, chemical plants, and steel plants. The company holds 146 domestic authorized patents (including 74 invention patents) and 194 international authorized invention patents. The company’s carbon capture and nitrogen fertilizer (ammonium sulfate and ammonium bicarbonate) joint production technology makes it a global leader in the low-carbon environmental protection field.

IAE is one of the earliest institutions in China that specializes in long-acting and high-efficiency fertilizer research. IAE possesses internationally advanced technologies and patents in nitrogen fertilizer (e.g., ammonium bicarbonate) efficiency enhancement fields.

Based on the principle of “resource sharing, complementary advantages, mutual benefit and win-win results, and joint development”, both parties will engage in a series of close cooperation in agriculture and environment fields by leveraging their respective strengths. Specifically, the two parties will adopt IAE’s environmentally friendly, stable composite fertilizer and fertilizer additive technology to improve the quality and efficiency of the fertilizers (ammonium bicarbonate, ammonium sulfate, etc.) produced by NJEP. They will also develop special fertilizers tailored for different regions and crops, promote the competitiveness of these fertilizers in the market, with the main goal of increasing farmers’ income and the green development of agriculture.