Tetra Pak, Switzerland, has launched a new Environmental Benchmarking Service to help food and beverage companies assess the environmental performance of their production operations, and to identify opportunities for improvement. The service provides an audit of the entire plant, including both the processing and packaging lines, assessing performance in areas such as water efficiency, waste water treatment, energy efficiency, product yield and waste, and carbon footprint. 

 

Based on this audit, the Tetra Pak Technical Service team will then provide specific recommendations on opportunities for improvement, helping customers not only to reduce their environmental impact, but also to lower cost.

 

Pilot projects have been carried out in the U.S. and in Europe, delivering average costs savings of around 20%. For example, with Pacific Foods, a U.S. based producer of organic foods and beverages, opportunities were found to reduce the carbon footprint by approximately 3,500 metric tons of CO2e and to cut water consumption by some 31 million liters, every year.

 

Rory Schmick, director of sustainability and environmental affairs at Pacific Foods said that "we strive to optimize environmental performance throughout our organization, whether conserving energy and reducing greenhouse gas emissions or minimizing our water footprint. We are always on the lookout for ways to innovate and improve. The Environmental Benchmarking Service identified concrete opportunities to enhance performance and reduce environmental impact throughout our facilities. Tetra Pak's deep knowledge in the industry makes the service really work."

 

Johan Nilsson, VP of Tetra Pak Technical Service, explained that "environmental performance is rising ever-higher on the agenda of our customers. They are constantly looking for solutions to lower their carbon footprint while reducing operational costs. Tetra Pak has delivered more than 150 operational improvement projects for customers over the past 10 years. Now, we are transforming the insights and know-how gained from these projects into a service that helps customers to assess their own environmental performance against that of their peers and recognized best practice, helping them to achieve sustainable improvements in both their environmental profile and their costs."