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Simply Fresh Foods produces pre-prepared foods for high street supermarkets.
One of its main produce are beansprouts, which need year-round heat and water. Given the Manchester climate, the company has to create these stable conditions artificially, and spends more than £250,000 on energy. Following a Carbon Trust survey, it was able to implement measures which have saved them £30,000 per annum.
Located in Manchester, Simply Fresh Foods produces pre-prepared foods for high street supermarkets. The company employs 330 people and is based at two different sites – one for growing food produce and the other for processing those foods. Beansprouts are grown and packed on site along with vegetables and noodles.
The two ingredients needed for beansprouts to grow naturally are heat and water. Because the former is not a permanent feature of the UK climate, the company has to look to the more reliable sources of electricity and gas to ensure that produce grows all year round.
In fact, each year the sites use more than 50 million gallons of water and has energy costs of more than £250,000.
Alistair Clark, the company’s Engineering Manager, had worked with the Carbon Trust before and was keen to make use of their free energy survey service. The survey recommended a series of energy saving measures, which included the following:
- Recovering waste heat from production processes.
- Good housekeeping – turning equipment off.
- Installation of automatic lighting controls.
- Use of heat recovery from refrigeration plant.
- Minimising water waste from washing processes.
- Good management of compressed air equipment.
- Better insulation of high and low temperature equipment.
As a result of the Carbon Trust surveys, staff at both sites have become more energy conscious. Alistair Clark views the company’s work with the Carbon Trust as time worth investing in for any business. “We have known for some time that could make savings but we needed a helping hand from the Carbon Trust to point us in the right direction - it’s always useful to have an expert second opinion.
“Since the survey our local water company has visited us to do some training on water awareness. Staff now understand that water, gas and electricity are not free but a precious resource that we pay for.”
So far the company’s energy bill has been reduced by £30,000 a year.
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