Essay About Product Portfolio And Greenhouse Gas Footprint Of Knorr

Estimating the Greenhouse Gas Footprint of Knorr
Estimating the Greenhouse Gas Footprint of Knorr
Purpose Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have been
identified as one of Unilevers priority environmental
impact themes: this assessment was therefore conducted to
help the Knorr brand measure and understand the GHG
emissions related to its product portfolio, identify opportunities
to manage GHG emissions in the Unilever-owned
operations (manufacture) and influence managed reductions
elsewhere in the Knorr product lifecycles, and assess the
impact of the brands innovation and portfolio strategies on its
GHG footprint.
Methods A bottom–up product-based life cycle assessment
(LCA) approach was considered impractical to assess
Knorrs portfolios complexity. Thus, a meta-product-based
accounting LCA approach was followed (Milà i Canals et al.
2009). Up to 16 product types or “meta-products” were
assessed in each geographical region, with a total of 36
meta-products assessed globally. Then, the Knorr GHG
footprint was derived by multiplying the impacts calculated
per tonne of each product type with the sales volumes in
2007. Data for ingredients and processing technologies were
gathered from the literature and suppliers; data from Knorr
factories were used for the manufacturing stage. The
variability in ingredients production and processing and in
manufacture was factored in and propagated through the
calculations to assess the robustness of the results.
Results The profiles of different meta-products within a
product group (e.g. dry soups) follow similar patterns in
terms of absolute GHG per tonne and distribution of such
emissions along the life cycle. Variations are observed due
to recipe