Sustainability is increasingly part and parcel of conducting business in food. Environmental sustainability embodies maximum preservation of our global natural resources at its core. This means minimizing use—and misuse—of nonrenewable resources, like water, while striving toward zero-waste landfill operations and actively reducing and eliminating point sources of pollution. It also means maximizing the clean-energy resources like wind and solar power, and making use of efficient approaches to generating energy, like fuel cells.
Pepperidge Farm, which received top honors in the new Wholesale Bakery category for this year’s IBIE 2016 B.E.S.T. in Baking Program, has invested in fuel cell energy for its bakery in Bloomfield, CT. The bakery has installed a state-of-the-art, DFC1500, 1,400-killowat fuel cell for the on-site generation of electricity. This is an extremely efficient approach to energy generation, and one that has a near-zero pollutant profile. In the wake of a successful trial, Pepperidge Farm is now adding a second fuel cell. Along with the bakery’s 1-megawatt solar installation, the two fuel cells will provide all of the facility’s required energy, selling excess juice back to the grid when possible.