FRANCE – French multinational food-products corporation, Danone, has unveiled an energy efficiency program to improve energy efficiency by 35% by 2025 and to reduce the company’s Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by a minimum of 42% by 2030.

Through the program dubbed ‘Re-fuel Danone’, Danone also plans to increase its use of renewable energy and have 100% of its electricity come from renewable sources by 2030.

Since 2015 Danone said it managed to reduce Scope 1 and Scope 2 carbon emissions by over 48% and has the commitment to reduce the emissions by a further 42% by 2030.

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, Scope 1 emissions are direct greenhouse gas emissions that occur from sources controlled or owned by a company while Scope 2 emissions are indirect GHG emissions associated with the purchase of electricity, steam, heat, or cooling.

On fuel switching, Danone has stated that its priority focuses for heating processes and buildings are biomass, solar thermal, and hydrogen.

One biomass project, in Indonesia, sees the corporate using crop husks to produce energy before returning the ash to farmers for use as fertilizer.

For both electricity and fuels, Danone has pledged to shift to local energy sources wherever possible, including self-generated renewable electricity and “a range of measures” including behavioral changes and more high-tech solutions, such as real-time building energy management systems (BEMS).

In some sites, including Wexford, Ireland, and Opole, Poland, artificial intelligence (AI) has been applied to BEMs, enabling rapid and accurate analysis of energy use.

edie’s recent Net-Zero Business Barometer Survey, completed by 148 energy and sustainability professionals at different organizations, found that 60% believe their employer has “heightened” work on energy efficiency.

Similarly, more than half (56%) said their organization is exploring or installing decentralized energy generation, such as onsite solar.

The majority of respondents also said that their organization is likely to invest in behavior change for sustainability in the next 12 months and this can be a cost-effective step whereas, 49% said this is either a ‘high’ priority or a ‘business-critical’ priority, however, only 5% said it was not a priority at all.

Danone’s global head of operations Vikram Agarwal said meeting the new commitments will make the business “more sustainable, agile, cost-efficient and resilient”.

Agarwal added: “It also adds to how we deliver for our customers and consumers and helps us reconnect performance and purpose, so marks further progress on our strategy to Renew Danone, the Group’s updated strategic plan, released back in March. “

The company stated that the plan “is all about creating the conditions for sustainable and competitive growth, and then delivering consistently in a way that creates sustainable value for all and does not contain many new environmental targets.

Rather it deepens the link between its existing sustainability ambitions and plans to improve innovation and profitability.

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