Food waste at the end of the value chains is a challenging problem currently solved with incineration, composting (or landfilling), and anaerobic digestion technologies. These processes are associated with high environmental impacts and low recycling of valuable nutrients, which can be achieved in a cascading upcycling of nutrients with live organisms. Methods to process such wastes into biomass of defined composition automatically and in decentralized locations are lacking. The study presents modular designs of food waste treatment relying on insect larvae of Hermetia illucens and continuous production of the heterotrophic alga Galdieria sulphuraria . Modular design was dictated by the need to have a mobile system of decentralized food waste treatment close to the point of origin, abilities of species to process the biomass, and potential for maximal automation. A life cycle and economic assessments were carried out on the hypothetical design to define whether the proposed systems would be viable. The designs resulted in continuous and semi-continuous designs able to produce dry biomass of 3.55 € per kg (H. illucens ) and of 4.38 € per kg (G. sulphuraria ), which would make them profitable in 5 years. Production of 1 kg of dry biomass of insects and microalgae was associated with impacts in global warming potential: 2.77 and 3.8 kg CO2 eq; in non-renewable energy use: 55.24 and 69.9 MJ; in arable land occupation: 0.68 and 0.09 m2 annually. Relying on 1 kg of proteins as a functional unit, it was possible to demonstrate that even small-scale insect and microalgae production processes have sustainability benefits when relying on food waste as feeding media. Moreover, automated, modular technology waste treatment is demonstrated to be more environmentally friendly than most waste treatment technologies applied to the end of the chain wastes. Speaker: Sergiy Smetana, PhD