Environmental Management at Fonterra - Essay Example

Environmental Management; Fonterra, Tirau Introduction The Fonterra Co-operative Limited is a co-operative and multi-national dairy company based in New Zealand whose contribution to the world dairy exports amounts to 30% while attracting revenue of almost twenty billion New Zealand dollars. The co-operatives members who own this manufacturing and retail company tend to be New Zealand dairy farmers whose number totals ten thousand. One of this cooperative’s principle plants is the Fonterra Tirau site whose year of establishment was 1933 and which began as a butter manufacturing site, and later changed to be a manufacturer of ethanol, lactic casein, and lactalbumin. The product made at this facility amounts to thousands of tons annually that feed both the foreign and the domestic markets. As the result of an upgrade in 1981, the true site operated by Fonterra is the only one that produces lactalbumin whose tonnage is 1400 annually and is an essential ingredient in nutritional applications. During the high season between August and December of each year, the true site usually processes almost 2.9 million liters on a daily basis, which is collected from the dairy farmers who are also shareholders in Fonterra. The other product manufactured at the Tirau site is lactic casein that totals 7000 tons annually, whose main export market is China, USA, most European states, and Japan (Fonterra, 2014). Impact Assessment Fonterra is one of the companies that has attracted the interest of environmentalists and government agencies charged with protecting the environment. This is not surprising since (“Water Quality in New Zealand” 2012) states milk processing plants are the major environmental pollutants in New Zealand, and this includes Fonterra’s sites. Tirau being a principle road town in the Waikato region has experienced an increase in commercial and agricultural activities over the years that have caused a major impact on the environment especially on the water resources. Subsequently, the water pH and levels of conductivity in Waikato region have been deteriorating gradually with the Waikato River experiencing high levels of pollution. According to environmental impact assessment reports, a majority of the industries that cause pollution is dairy farming and product plants together with the use of high nitrogen fertilizers that have made the water pH levels in these regions to deteriorate. Fonterra Tirau understands that the industrial activities conducted at this plant is one of the key contributors to the environmental degradation of the Waikato region and has put in place measures intended to mitigate this occurrence. In this regard, Fonterra Tirau has involved itself deeply in the environmental preservation activities in Waikato that has had the Environment Waikato department praising their efforts of working with the community to reduce their environmental impact. This is one of the sustainable practices that Fonterra in Tirau has applied in the execution of its business in this region. In addition to wastewater and whey, the Tirau plant releases air pollutants which result from the boiler heating and combustion processes which may pollute the air if released at low altitudes. Environment management tools used by Fonterra, Tirau Many organizations, Fonterra included, prefer to use environment management tools that are cost effective and less time consuming in terms of assessment and implementation for its daily operations. Fonterra philosophy on environmental management revolves around the protection of the environment through sustainable practices for future generations by reducing their impact on the same. With this Fonterra seeks to apply supply programs that are within their jurisdiction in order for the organization to continue producing milk products that meet the quality standards in relation to food safety, environmental and animal welfare concerns. In line with this, Fonterra has adopted the manual and registers tool by the Department of Environment, which enables the organization to document data for their Environmental Management Services. The tool when applied together with the organization’s already existing Environmental management system tool can be helpful in the continuous improvement of the management system. This tool is essential because it can help in giving important information as per the ISO certification framework. The other environmental management tool used by Fonterra is the Every farm, Every Year program which the organization uses to assist farmers within the co-operative with specific environmental issues. This works hand-in-hand with an improved system that finally penalizes suppliers that perform poorly (“Fonterra to Check Effluent Systems”, 2014). Waste minimization Owing to the fact that the Tirau plant uses milk as a main raw material in the production of lactalbumin and lactic casein, there are some resulting byproducts that are environmentally harmful and require safe disposal or minimization. The wastewater released into the environment annually is about 1.25 million cubic meters, total whey production is 3,500 tonnes of whey concentrate, in addition to air particulates from boilers and milk dryers. For instance in the production of lactic casein, the milk has to be separated into whey and casein. Once the separation is done, the resulting casein is taken and that leaves the whey. According to Schauss (2007), acidic whey is highly toxic and cannot be allowed to drain into the ground or into waterways due to its high acidity. Once it gets into waterways, it depletes all the oxygen present in the water leading to massive death of aquatic life. This information raises an alarm in that from higher production levels at the Tirau plant, this might be a looming environmental disaster thus the need to address the problem before it develops into a real problem. However, “Waste Management” (2014) states that there is a program rolled out across all of the Fonterra sites in New Zealand dubbed “Eco-efficiency Champion” aimed at reducing waste production. In addition, the program has succeeded in reducing waste by above 92 percent through recycling and reusing byproducts. The program works by eliminating, reducing, recycling, reusing and designing systems of operation that minimize the amount of waste that requires disposal to the environment. The Tirau site is specifically known for its reduction measure of converting the resulting whey into ethanol for human use, as a biofuel, alternatively, a solution of Nutrilac protein can be added to the acid whey to convert it into a raw material that can be used to make more products. The resulting product, sweet whey, is used in making processed foods such as crackers and bread, and also as an additive in animal feed. Sweet whey can also be used as a substitution for milk in baking recipes and as a flour conditioner. The other strategies applied in waste minimization include collecting and recycling bag house fillers and socks, which contain polypropylenes and stainless steel; collecting and recycling mixed grade sampling bottles; cheese and powder bags are recycled and used as covers for underground manholes; feeding all food scraps from lunchrooms to some worm composting units created across the sites. The worms feed on the scraps and convert them into fertilizer used in growing trees and plants in the factory grounds.. Waste Treatment After the solution was found in reusing whey, the other significant waste that is still a problem to the Fonterra Tirau site is the millions of liters in wastewater used inside the factory. The waste water may contain traces of whey or other complex compounds that may be harmful to the environment. It was for this reason that the Tirau site decided to use a lagoon system to treat the resulting wastewater. The idea was partially successful, however, the aerators put in place were consuming large amounts of power averaging 1 Megawatt during season peaks, and the quality of the effluent that the lagoons produced was not up-to-standard, and finally the system was later incapable of catering for the expanding wastewater amounts as the plant expanded to match the increasing demand for the products bought by an expanding economy. Following the emergence of this new problem, the Fonterra Tirau site decided to find means of inventing a system that would be better suited to expand the treatment capacity, reduce the rate of power consumption and finally improve the quality of the resulting effluent. The solution was found around 1984, and the idea was to use a Bioenergy wastewater treatment system that would save power, produce up-to-standard effluent, and hold the extensive volume of water generated daily. The Tirau site, then decided to set up anaerobic wastewater treatment plants which use the biological concept of treating the water without using elemental oxygen. Rather, the water with dissolved organic matter [pollutants] is fed with micro-organisms which consume it and give off gas which can be used for economic purposes. The resulting gas is methane, and is used in heating some of the boilers at the plant. As Jiménez & Asano (2008) note, the remaining organic matter, which is now safe for the environment, is dried and sold to farmers as fertilizer whereas the now safe water is used for irrigating large acres of land under cultivation. Fonterra’s resource consents across all its sites (Tirau included) particularly address wastewater, land, and air pollutants. The wastewater is a combination of treated water from the plant with treated (activated) sludge which is deposited at the company’s grounds. The wastewater is used for irrigation and the activated sludge which is acquired after condensation is used as fertilizer. The consent dictates that annually, the wastewater released into the environment should be below 1.25 million cubic meters, or an average 5,720 cubic meters daily, and this emptying is limited to approximately 349 hectares of land. On air pollutant emissions, which result from the combustion processes, the discharging is allowed at a height of about 51.5 meters. Milk powder dryers also emit particulates at the rate of 16 tonnes an hour, and their emission is allowed at about 56 meters into the atmosphere. On matters of land, the consents allow building of facilities not beyond 40 meters high, produce noise within the set limits, and construct ponds at 150 meters away from residential areas (“Fonterra Co-Operative Group”, date). Energy efficiency initiatives The energy required to convert the milk from its natural state to the byproducts that leave the factory as finished products is considerable. The total energy consumed by the Fonterra sites combined in the year 2010 was above 5,500 Gigawatt Hours. It may seem overly expensive, but that is compensated for by the fact that the industry contributes to twenty-five percent of the country’s exports. In addition to electricity, the Tirau plant uses oil, gas, and coal to generate the heat required in most of the manufacturing processes. Some of the processes that require higher temperatures include converting the milk into powder through evaporation. This is necessary because it further saves energy during transportation since according to “Energy” (2014), evaporating one liter of water from the milk saves about a kilogram of weight. One of the energy efficiency initiatives taken up by Fonterra Tirau [and other sites] is cogeneration. This is the process of combining several sources of energy to provide the energy required at the plant. Electricity is alternated or combined with gas, coal or oil to generate heat, which is more efficient than just relying on electricity alone. More interesting is that this site uses biomass, that is yard clippings, dead stumps and branches, and plant remains, plus residue and the effluent resulting from the anaerobic wastewater treatment system at Tirau to provide heat in the boilers. The other strategy is minimizing milk collection tankers’ energy consumption as they travel roughly eighty million kilometers annually around New Zealand to collect milk (“Fonterra Sustainability”, 2014). To achieve an energy efficiency that is both cost and eco-friendly, they; one, pre-concentrate, milk before transporting it so that more milk is packed and transported with less chance of going bald. Two, they promote transport by rail so that more loads can be carried for long distances, but cheaply and saving on tanker fuel. Third is upgrading the tankers to meet the standards of the Euro 4 emission policies, and finally optimizing tanker routes through the installation of scheduling software in them. Another efficiency initiative in place is the auditing of energy consumption in the entire manufacturing process in which the findings are analyzed and adjustments made to achieve the lowest possible energy consumption. This information is shared amongst farmers and the stakeholders in general as a tool of saving both energy and money. The final and most effective strategy is recovering lost energy and putting it to use through biogas production. The anaerobic wastewater treatment plants give off biogas as a byproduct. The gas is tapped and stored where it is later used in heating boilers in the manufacturing processes. This is quite thoughtful in that it uses “its own” byproducts to produce energy which would otherwise be lost to the environment. Conclusion The above study text is derived from the analyzation of Fontera Tirau’s environmental management strategies and tools. The reason why this plant is a good sample for the evaluation is because in New Zealand, milk production and processing is a major economic activity, and the processing produces large volumes of waste which has to be disposed of safely. The revelation is that the manufacturing process requires a lot of energy to come up with the final products, which is inevitable. In addition, the activities running in the factory may affect the natural environment negatively when they improperly dispose of their waste or misuse energy sources. These identified, they call for mitigation measures to minimize the amount of toxicity offered to the environment in addition to efficiently consuming energy. From the case study, it is sufficient to justify that most factories evaluate their impacts on the environment and their power consumption and adjust to match with the recommended standards. The conclusion is that whatever has been done by Fonterra is sufficient in preserving the environment because their sites, such as Tirau have implemented effective measures that take care of the byproducts of the company’s wastes which would otherwise be harmful to the environment. Furthermore, they have gone an extra mile in recovering energy such as using biomass and producing biogas which make use of energy otherwise deemed as unusable. References “Energy”. (2014). Fonterra Sustainability Fact Sheet. 1-2. Fonterra. (2014). Retrieved on 3 April, 2014 from https://www.fonterra.com/global/en “Fonterra Co-Operative Group Limited- Pahiatua Expansion.” (2013). Horizons Regional Council. Accessed on date from http://www.horizons.govt.nz/managing-environment/resource-management/consents-2/current-notified-applications/fonterra-co-operative-group-limited-pahiatua-expansion/ “Fonterra Sustainability Fact Sheet: Energy”. (2014). Fonterra. 1-2. “Fonterra to Check Effluent Systems on Every Farm, Every Year”. (2014). Voxy.co.nz. Retrieved on 3 April, 2014 from http://www.voxy.co.nz/business/fonterra-check-effluent-systems-every-farm-every-year/5/42078Schauss, M. A. (2007). Achieving victory over a toxic world. Bloomington, IN: AuthorHouse. Fresh Water Solutions. (2009). “Fonterra Tirau Plant: Wastewater and Cooling Water Discharge Reconsenting”. Fresh Water Solutions.co.nz. Retrieved on 3 April from http://freshwatersolutions.co.nz/projects/fonterra-tirau-reconsenting/ Jiménez, C. B. E., & Asano, T. (2008). Water reuse: An international survey of current practice, issues and needs. London: IWA Pub. “Water Quality in New Zealand: Understanding the Science”. (2012, March). Parliamentary Commsioner for the Environment. 1-93. “Waste Management”. (2014). Fonterra Sustainability Fact Sheet. 1-2. Read More