Oakpark Foods Limited

Exemplary Performance Target Areas

Minimum Origin Green Targets Required Annually = 6

Spotlight Target Area: Energy

Oakpark started their journey with Origin Green in 2016 and using 2015 as their baseline year, they developed a 5 year sustainability plan setting targets to measure their sustainability impacts. The company’s main source of energy is electricity so this became one of the main areas they focussed on and set a stretch target for.

Seeing a huge opportunity to deliver real cost savings and efficiencies, the team at Cahir set an ambitious target to reduce their electricity usage by 30% kWh/kg output by 2020.  Project led by Regina McGuirk and Colm Murphy , the team made significant progress in 2019 and exceeded this target resulting in a 32% reduction in electricity in kWh/kg output for the year. 

Energy Saving Actions

The team implemented a wide array of energy saving actions such as:

• Ongoing replacement of fluorescent lights with LED/sensor lights
• Refrigeration upgrade to compressor packs and fridge units
• Added a remote start /stop system on vacuum pumps synchronized with Multivac start button
• Re-piped the compressed air system which led to a reduction in power consumption (by reducing the psi pressure on the generator), 
• Replaced the electrical terminals for MCB panels, and installed power factor correction to reduce the amount of reactive power and avoid wattless unit charges
• Replaced a number of fan units in the factory to new energy efficient units
• Installation of a new energy efficient gas-fired smoke oven
• Added PIR sensor lights in amenity areas.

“Achieving this status is testament to the hard work and dedication by our team in delivering on our ambitious targets. Sustainability is now an expectation in the mind of the consumer and this prestigious recognition will help Oakpark to further grow our business in European retail markets.”

David Brett, MD