Wyke Farms Highly Commended at Final of ‘BusinessGreen’ Leaders Award 2013
Wyke Farms, the UK’s largest independent cheese producer and milk processor, was ‘Highly Commended’ at the recent Business Green Leaders Awards. The ‘Company of the Year’ category had four finalists – Marks & Spencer (winners) and Sainsbury’s and Interface as the other finalists.
Wyke Farms achieved ‘Highly Commended’ in recognition for its renewable energy project, which aims to create a sustainable working farm, one in which it sources all of its electricity and gas from both solar and biogas, generated from the farm and dairy waste. Wyke Farms has made a commitment to be one of the first national food brands to be self-sufficient in green energy.
As part of this goal, Wyke Farms has started to build its own anaerobic digester (AD) plant, which will deliver significant environmental benefits. It will simultaneously reduce and manage waste and produce energy. Wyke Farms’ biodegradable waste materials will be used as fuel for the AD plant. The digestate produced will be used as a fertilizer and the biogas energy generated will be used to run a combined heat and power plant, enabling Wyke Farms to save over 4 million kilos of carbon dioxide per annum.
Wyke Farms has been producing cheddar for over a century and has grown to become the largest family-owned cheese maker in Britain, selling over 14,000 tonnes annually.
