Sainsbury's To Generate Power From Food Waste

Tue, 04 Nov 2008

Sainsbury's has unveiled plans to power its stores using electricity generated from thousands of tons of food waste from its store operations .

The supermarket chain is to begin converting the waste into methane gas, which will then be used to provide electricity for heat and light in its stores from next year.

Following a trial in Northamptonshire involving 38 Sainsbury's stores, supply chain director Lawrence Christensen announced that the process will be rolled out nationwide, adding that Sainsbury's wants to become the first British retailer not to send any waste to landfill sites .

At present, Sainsburys sends 60,000 tons of food waste to landfill every year from its 800 UK stores .

Under the new scheme, this amount of waste will all be sent to a network of five regional anaerobic digestor plants and converted into methane gas, which will be used to generate power. Some will be composted for use as fertiliser and, in a few cases, turned into pet food .

Once underway, the programme will generate up to 30 megawatts of electricity - enough power for a town of 20,000 people.

The new scheme will also save the retailer a considerable amount in tax . Under the current process, tax for landfilling 60,000 tons of food waste would increase from £1.8million to nearly £2.8 million by 2010, due to increasingly steep levies on waste sent to landfill.

Sainsbury's declined to comment on how much it plans to spend on the new programme, but Mr Christensen insisted that it would be cost-effective.