From baguettes to beer, the world’s leading food and drinks makers are rushing to reduce their carbon footprint by tackling one of the hidden culprits of emissions in their value chains: fertilisers.
Ahead of disclosure rules for greenhouse emissions throughout their supply chains enacted next year, companies including PepsiCo, Heineken and Nestlé have turned to green fertiliser start-ups to help tackle emission levels.
Crop nutrients underpin production of half the world’s food but contribute significant CO₂ emissions at the same time. Fertilisers used for agricultural ingredients account for about 15 per cent of total emissions from beer supply chains and 35-40 per cent for bread, according to industry experts.
Nitrogen-based fertiliser and farm manure make up 5 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, producing 2.6bn tonnes of CO₂ a year, more than global aviation and shipping combined, according to research published by the journal Nature Food.
It’s worth noting that one of it not the the largest current uses for hydrogen is for producing ammonia nitrate fertilizers, and that’s currently done with methane steam reformation, which produces an massive amount of co2 compared to the hydrogen. Just getting that demand replaced with green hydrogen would be a massive reduction in co2.