FrieslandCampina has announced plans to purchase its electricity directly from its member dairy farmers as part of its next step in sustainable energy.
According to the dairy cooperative, 94% of its worldwide electricity usage in 2019 was ‘green’.
For 2020, FrieslandCampina aims for its electricity usage to be 100% green and plans to purchase it directly from its member dairy farmers and pay them in line with market prices.
To achieve this, the company will work with Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs), which allows direct purchase from farmers, and will team up with CNS, a specialist in the field.
Currently more than 50 dairy farmer members already supply green energy to FrieslandCampina via PPAs, accounting for about 10% of the Dutch electricity needs of the dairy company.
Previous commonplace is Guarantees of Origins offering certified proof that energy has been generated sustainably.
FrieslandCampina’s construction, meanwhile, means it is possible to maintain this value within the dairy chain with direct contracts and enables the producer to be immediately rewarded in line with the market by its own dairy company.
Using its programmes such as Solar, Wind (collaboration with E.A.Z wind) and Jumpstart (extraction of green energy from manure), FrieslandCampina aims to accelerate sustainable energy generation on farms.
In August 2018, the company announced that half of the electricity requirements of its production locations and offices in the Netherlands now come from solar power, thanks to a growth of the company’s solar initiative.
Most recently, FrieslandCampina teamed up with Barry Callebaut in a bid to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through cow feed additive.
In January 2020, the Dutch dairy cooperative also announced an additional annual investment of €24m to stimulate sustainable development on the dairy farms of its farmer members.
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