"The first crucial step is to get the data right."
Paul Bruijn
Safety, Health and Environmental
Specialist, Supply Chain Services
Heineken International,
the Netherlands
were also achieved with the help of energy-saving
programmes focused specifically on plant and
equipment that consumes significant amounts
of electricity.
In the summer of 2007, we piloted a workshop
session focused on energy at our Group head-
office in Amsterdam. The purpose of the session
was to spark discussion on energy and climate
change. Information was provided on the activities
that Heineken currently undertakes in relation
to energy. Employees were given the opportunity
to bring ideas forward on how to reduce energy
consumption outside the brewing, production and
packaging aspects of our business. The initiative
generated some useful ideas and the intention is to
roll out similar workshops throughout the business
to both raise awareness and support direct action.
Performance in 2007
The programmes and activities mentioned
above helped us to deliver an improvement
in our specific energy consumption of 9 per cent
compared with 2002 and we are on track to
achieve our target of 15 per cent improvement
by 2010. The group of breweries and production
units that were in scope when we made the
commitment in 2002 has already met the target
set for 2010, three years earlier than originally
anticipated. Given the significant acquisitions
since 2002, our challenge is to ensure the newly
acquired businesses up to the end of 2007 (mainly
in developing markets) meet the target.
09
Carbon labelling
TA
Exploring the feasibility of carbon labelling
The European Union Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS)
sets out seven key priority challenges, including one focused on
sustainable consumption and production. SDS emphasises the need
to minimise environmental damage and make sustainable use of
the earth's resources. It identifies consumers and the choices they
make, as key drivers for sustainable development - emphasising
the value that energy labelling, eco-labelling and carbon labelling
of products can play in prompting consumers to make sustainable
buying decisions.
A carbon label displays the quantified carbon dioxide footprint of
the product - defined as the total amount of greenhouse gases
(expressed in C02 equivalents) emitted over the product's entire life
cycle. This footprint can be calculated using the standard for Life
Cycle Assessment according to IS014040.
The environmental team from Heineken Supply Chain have
researched ways to find an effective calculation model for our
products - based on several factors including packaging, materials,
distance to consumer and dispensing methods. The first results of
their work show that the carbon footprint for one litre of packed beer
varies according to the type of packaging used and the transportation
distance covered although we need more accurate input data to be
able to calculate the exact numbers of the total footprint.
With such huge variables as transport, supply chain, the sourcing
of materials and delivery distances for units of an identical product,
the study provides valuable insight into the very real difficulties that
must be overcome to provide truly accurate carbon labelling on our
brands. This research will continue, with the focus now on sourcing
more reliable, validated data, defining our supply chains and
identifying carbon footprint 'range' figures for our beer products.
Heineken N.V. Sustainability Report 2007
