Northland's Golden Bay Cement has been hailed for its use of bioenergy to reduce CO2 emissions, winning the renewable energy category in the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority Awards.
The Portland-based company has cut CO2 emissions by a huge 58,000 tonnes a year and is saving $3 million every year in energy costs, as a result of substituting nearly a third of the coal burned for wood fuel.
This also includes wood sourced from demolition and construction waste that would otherwise be landfilled.
The project makes Golden Bay Cement New Zealand's largest known user of renewable wood energy outside the wood processing sector.
Its CO2 savings are the highest of any award finalist except the supreme award winner, Air New Zealand, which is avoiding 142,000 tonnes of CO2 a year.
EECA chief executive Mike Underhill said Golden Bay was setting the bar for other energy-intensive industries. "It's inspiring to see a big industrial user like Golden Bay take a leap of faith and start switching to renewable bioenergy, particularly sourced from wood waste."
Mr Underhill said the authority hoped Golden Bay Cement would inspire other energy-intensive industries like dairy.
"Industrial heat accounts for more than 30 per cent of our national energy use - and, along with transport, it has the most scope for improvement in terms of efficiency and increasing use of renewable energy," he said.
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