Cutting CO2 emissions
Reducing CO2 emissions remains the cornerstone of the industry's efforts to increase the
sustainability of food and drink manufacturing and contribute to the growth of a
greener economy in the UK.
Our Commitment
To work collectively to tackle climate change by making an absolute reduction in
CO2 emissions of 20% by 2010 and 35% by 2020 against a 1990 baseline.
Progress Made
Our last progress report (based on 2009 data) showed cumulative savings of 21%,
passing our 2010 milestone a year early.
Latest figures for 2010 show we have actually achieved
savings of 25%, while continuing to increase output – a substantial
productivity
gain.
FDF has continued to work with Government and a range of other partners to
deliver year on year savings. In particular, we have worked with the British
Standards Institution on revising
methodologies for assessing the life cycle greenhouse gas emissions of goods
and
services (PAS 2050). We are a leading participant in the work of WRAP's Product
Research Forum
project to improve the availability and accuracy of wider environmental impact
data for consumer products.
We are also participating in similar work at European level in the Food
Sustainable Consumption and Production Roundtable.
Given the importance of incentivising further progress, we were pleased at the
announcement in the March Budget that the existing food sector Climate Change
Agreement will continue
until 2023 at least. This provides a vital framework to support and measure
what
our members are achieving.
The Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) is currently consulting on
ways to streamline administrative arrangements and we are actively engaging in
this process.
We have also continued to work with the Carbon Trust and others on the
Industrial Energy Efficiency Accelerator (IEEA) programmes for the industrial
bread
baking and the sugar
confectionary sectors. Stage 1 of the programme, to identify potential energy
savings, has been completed and a number of companies have progressed to
implementing identified
solutions in Stage 2.
Our last report looked forward to a third IEEA programme covering the frozen and
chilled food. But following the withdrawal of funding for this in the
Government's Spending Review we are exploring alternative projects to support
energy
efficiency in these important sectors.
We also committed to review our reporting methodology for the CO2 Ambition to
align more closely with recognised publicly-available standards and to explore
reporting of other greenhouse gases aside from carbon dioxide. This work is
still
ongoing as it depends on possible changes to the form of future Climate Change
Agreements resulting from the DECC review and on developments in regulations
relating to fluorinated greenhouse gases (F gases).
top
More Information
Last reviewed: 06 Dec 2011