Greening Tater Chips
By Karina | July 2, 2008
I was enjoying a delicious tofu, bok choy and sugar snap peas stir fry (thank you, CSA!) at lunch yesterday and I wanted a little bit more - so I succumbed to my achilles heel. No, not ice cream - cheese flavoring. I love things that are orange and dusty and taste like cheese, and I am not ashamed to admit it. So yesterday I grabbed a bag of Harvest Cheddar SunChips and after I finished eating it, I noticed this on the back of the bag:
At Sunchips we really do live up to our name. This year, we began using solar collectors at one of our SunChips plants to harness the power of the sun to help make SunChips snacks. We also buy green energy credits to offset 100% of the electricity needed to produce SunChips snacks.
Wow, I was totally not expecting that! So I started to look around. First I followed the link on the back of the bag to Green-e to check out this certifying organization. In order to be included in the “marketplace” and use the logo, a company must commit to purchasing renewable energy (also conveniently licensed by Green-e) and pay a fee (which is nominal for a company the size of FritoLay).
Then I went over to FritoLay’s page - they installed solar collectors in their Modesto CA facility that uses the power of the sun and the amazing magical science of concave mirrors to heat water in tubes until it is steamy, and then using that water to heat the cooking oil. Pretty cool, hey? They also say: “By using solar energy in place of natural gas, we will avoid more than 1.7 million pounds of CO2 emissions every year. And our collectors produce enough steam here to help make 145,000 bags of SUN CHIPS® every day.” But that’s not all - they also state that: “since 1999, we have reduced our use of water by 39%, natural gas by 30%, and electricity by 22% for each bag of snacks we make… by making change to our overall facilities and fleet, we were able to prevent over 96 million pounds of CO2 emissions from reaching the atmosphere last year.” Plus there’s a list of the other conservation measures they’ve implemented here.
Here is the one that really impresses me: PepsiCo (the parent company of FritoLay) has implemented a change-a-light pledge in partnership with the Energy Star program. You can see how the number of bulbs changed from incandescent to CFL annually has tripled in the last year alone! What a great program, and one that everyone can take part in as well. Talk about implementing Tiny Choices from the top down!
This next part is a little bit hard for me. I am a die-hard Coke drinker when I feel the need for a cola beverage (hey, I grew up in the south! that’s what we drink down! And I do want to point out that Coke has an environmental sustainability page as well). But I really have to hand it to PepsiCo! They are doing a great job - not just on a corporate level (check out their sustainability vision and their sustainability report, with the environmental sustainability page here) but in a way that is educating their employees too.
Now if only they could take leadership on and solve that pesky mylar package problem. How many mylar bags of chips could be saved, do you think?
Have you been recently surprised by a company’s commitment to the environment?
Photo from Flickr user Todd Ehlers via creative commons license.
Topics: Food |
Bravo Sun Chips!
I remember when I was a kid, we ate Charles Chips…every week, you would take the Charles Chips cannister to the grocery store, and they would fill it with chips from a giant container for $1.00. Woe to the customer who got scooped from the bottom of the 5gal tubs, but it was a nice way to buy fresh chips and save a bag. And I would guess it went a long way in building brand loyalty, as you had to go to the store on a certain day to get the fresh chips.
I remember these too! We used to have them at my grandmother’s house in Harrisburg, Pa. I can’t remember seeing them anywhere else, so they must have been made around there. (Local potato chips - yay!)
[…] Tiny Choices inspects chips and sodas. […]
Hey, I’m from the South, and Pepsi’s just fine by me. I am honestly weirded out by people who care one way or the other. It’s fizzy, corn-syrupy cola, I don’t care if it comes in a red or blue can. Which one is on Sale? Store Brand? That’s what I’ll have, then!
As For Pepsico being green(ish), it reminds me of Chris Rock’s routine about some Black Men wanting credit and congratulations for doing things like “not being in jail”. and “taking care of their kids”.
Sorry, but a Commitment to environmentalism would be seeing ALL their chips (and sodas, and pizzas, and chicken, and crackers, and tacos, and etc…..) made with this same commitment to sustainability. Way to go Pepsico, you suck a little bit less. What, you want a cookie or somethin’? You still make one thousand-jillion disposable 20-ounce bottles (and “fun-sized” 12 ounce ones too) out of Plastic (which is made out of that OIL stuff we don’t seem to have enough of these days) that end up clogging up our landfills!
Hey… Starting today I’m only gonna beat up homeless people 4 days a week. I’m giving them Fridays off! Ain’t I something?
I know that we can’t change the world all at once. I mean Tiny Choices, right? But Pepsico has a Market Capitalization of over 107 BILLION Dollars! (Which is More than Dr. Evil asked for to ransom the whole world!) If you got a hundred billion dollars, your “Tiny” choices better be a BILLION times less tiny than mine. At Least!
Here is the VERY NSFW Chris Rock bit mentioned above:
NOT SAFE FOR WORK, for the acronym impaired.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpUSElgJcyI
I just think coke tastes better than pepsi, you know? but I can’t wait to try open source cola.
and yeah! tiny choices! and I think that most of my impressivement is that I didn’t expect *anything* from PepsiCo, so was very pleasantly surprised.
Yeah, Let me know how that OS Cola works out. Seriously, who has the ingredients for that laying around their kitchen? Sounds like a job for a cola co-op, or something. Maybe a local microbrewery could handle it?
i feel a little bit on the jaded side too, about this issue. While I love when any giant coorperation starts taking measures to make a light footprint (even if it’s just to save themselves even more money) … but I can’t say i’d support them in anything else they do. Serving up people all over the world shit tons of junk food that is causing massive health probs which people are on endless pharmacopia for just is not sustainable. The junky soda and chips and such are really addictive and people down them in huge quantities, having no real idea of the consequances on their health. The sickness of so many humans is the sickness of the planet - the more people are suffering the more they pollute, use up resources, and stay in a constant cycle on damage.
I really feel like our body’s health is a great place to start with the planet’s health - it seems to go hand in hand.
Not to mention, without all the sugar high & sugar low mood swings making people mean - the world would be a nicer place.
Phew! I got that off my chest :)
totally agree. but, i guess we have to be grateful for small things. and if pepsi and coke have so much influence over the masses, maybe - just maybe - their tiny choices will affect some of those masses?
it’s a thought … one that, honestly, will help me sleep better … even if it’s one of those “perfect world” thoughts …