Dive Summary:
- Winterdale Cheesemakers in the U.K. began transitioning to 100% carbon-neutral sources for its cheese-production facility in 2011, and has since fully achieved their goal with enough power left over to charge an electric vehicle.
- The company, uses a ground source heat pump and PV (photovoltaic) solar panels to achieve zero-emission status.
- Juliet Harbutt of the British Cheese Awards said the process even makes the cheese taste better in the end.
From the article:
“We always use morning milk from our family farm and start the cheesemaking process off while it's still warm, as this saves masses of energy. It also makes the cheese really creamy. The perfect temperature for cheesemaking is 32 degrees, just less than the 37-degree body temperature at which it's collected. We add starter culture, then the rennet and the curd is cut and cooked. The energy required comes from a ground source heat pump that heats the water to 50 degrees and then our solar panels take the temperature up those last few degrees required ..."
