URC makes push toward 100% clean energy use

MANILA, Philippines — Gokongwei-owned food firm Universal Robina Corp. (URC) is stepping up its initiatives toward green energy with the goal of using 100 percent renewable energy within the decade, its president Irwin Lee said.

These initiatives are in support of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal 13 (Climate Action), which seeks to combat climate change and address its impact.

URC’s Agro-Industrial Group (AIG) and the Sugar and Renewables Group (SURE) have been utilizing agricultural and food waste, and other organic materials as a renewable energy source.

Since 2015, AIG has been generating over 600 megawatts a year at its poultry farm in Naic, Cavite, and pig farm in San Miguel, Bulacan, using biogas.

SURE likewise kept the biogas program in place when it took over the assets of Roxas Holdings Inc. in La Carlota City, Negros Occidental in 2020.

“These efforts are part of URC’s overall push towards reaching its ‘net zero’ goal by 2050, by sourcing its energy needs from power producers that use renewable sources,” said Lee.

AIG’s poultry farm in Naic provides more than enough chicken dung to power a 270 kilovolt ampere (Kva) generator.

Similarly, the pig farm in Bulacan powers 2 x 500 Kva generator from its biogas output.

Animal waste is conveyed, collected and stored into covered anaerobic tanks, URC said.

It is in these tanks where digestion of organic matter begins – microbes feed on organic matter, such as protein, carbohydrates and lipids, to produce biogas. During the digestion process, solids are then exhumed and used as soil enrichers or fertilizers.

For SURE, biogas has displaced up to 40 percent of its solid fuel needs in its La Carlota Distillery. Biomass mainly powers its boilers.

In 2021, a total of 871,000 Giga Joule (GJ) of energy was produced from the utilization of biomass.

.URC signed an agreement with MPower/Vantage, Bacman, and First Gen to supply at least 18 of its facilities in Luzon and two more in the Visayas with geothermal, solar and hydro energy.

These include factories in Pasig, Laguna, Cavite, Pampanga, Antipolo and Bulacan, as well as facilities in Cebu and Negros Occidental.

Aside from producing renewable energy, URC’s Branded Consumer Foods (BCF) Group also started sourcing its energy needs from power producers that use renewable sources.