24 Mar 2015 Bernard Matthews’ Big Green Plan
Bernard Matthews recognises just how important green energy is to ensure a healthy and sustainable future for the business whilst better managing natural resources and protecting the environment for future generations. This ethos has provided the basis for Bernard Matthews’ Big Green Plan; the company’s blueprint for working with nature’s resources to responsibly develop and grow their business.
Launched three years ago, The Big Green Plan is on track to ensure the company is completely energy self-sufficient by 2016 and carbon neutral by 2020. A range of renewable energy projects consisting of wind and solar power have been initiated across the Bernard Matthews estate of farms and processing plants. These include a 55 acre solar farm, the current installation of over 200 biomass boilers across 30 farms, an anaerobic digestion plant, four wind turbines already installed on Bernard Matthews sites across East Anglia with another five planned.
Each of these wind turbines generates enough electricity to power 700 homes each and the energy produced by the solar farm is enough to power 3,000 homes. Most of the energy produced through these methods is sold back to the National Grid. Rob Burnett, CEO of Bernard Matthews, comments:
“Sustainability is central to our long term business strategy. We’re already generating a large proportion of our energy needs from renewable sources including solar, wind, waste and biomass and are well placed to be generating 100 per cent of our electricity sustainably by 2016.”