PepsiCo UK Aims to Ditch Fossil Fuels by 2023

PepsiCo’s operations in the British isles plan to be fossil fuel- free by 2023, the company has announced.

PepsiCo UK and Ireland’s second environmental sustainability report says the company will make sure all energy for its manufacturing and distribution in the two countries is from renewable sources within the next 13 years.

Currently 4 percent of PepsiCo UK’s energy, and 17 percent of its electricity, is from renewables.

PepsiCo UK also says it will replace its entire delivery fleet with “the latest low-emissions vehicles”.

“I’m pleased that amidst the economic challenges presented by the last year, we have delivered good progress against many of our commitments,” president Richard Evans said.

“However, our journey on the ‘path to zero’ does not end here. We have set ourselves purposefully stretching targets to unplug from the water grid, become fossil fuel free, reduce packaging and landfill waste and increase our use of renewables.”

Evans recently called for the UK government to simplify its renewable energy legislation.

PepsiCo UK last year announced a goal to halve its key growers’ agricultural carbon emissions by 2015.

The company says it aims to use zero water intake at its largest manufacturing sites within ten years. It has trialled technology to extract water from potatoes and has cut water use at British factories by 13 percent per kg of productin.

“Water is the poor second cousin of carbon,” PepsiCo UK vice president of operations Walter Todd said. “In the UK I do believe that unless you can show you are a responsible water steward from an agricultural and manufacturing perspective there are areas in the UK that will limit you ability to operate.”

The company also said it will achieve zero landfill waste across its supply chain within ten years, and by 2018 wants all its product packaging to be renewable, recyclable or compostable.

Nine of PepsiCo UK’s manufacturing and distribution sites have achieved zero landfill waste so far, the company said, cutting total landfill waste by 71 percent.

PepsiCo UK brand Walkers is looking at using potato peels to make more environmentally friendly chip bags.

But the sustainability report said PepsiCo UK missed a target of reducing Walkers’ packaging weight by 10 percent by 2010.