According to the Nordic Nutrient Recommendations, plant-based diets are the way ahead for human health and climate change. As a result, KMC has provided high-quality ingredients to produce delicious, plant based cheeses.

On June 21^st, the New Nordic Nutrient Recommendations 2023 were published, providing a clear list of dietary recommendations for human consumption that promote a healthy lifestyle with low environmental impacts.

The recommendations were mainly plant based, with the exception of fish. Meats, dairy products and other animal-based foods were suggested to be consumed moderately due to their high carbon footprints. As a result, the delicious flavors and consumption habits from animal products must be found elsewhere. 

The Secret Ingredient

Producing animal-like products without the use of animal-based ingredients can be a brain twister. However, KMC has now mastered the production of plant-based cheese without the use of milk. The secret ingredient is potato starch.

By using potato starch, KMC has uncovered the recipe for alternative cheeses, without compromising the taste, consistency or mouthfeel

So far, the alternative cheeses can be found in in the form of pizza toppings, cheese spreads and hard cheeses. Depending on the type of cheese, the potato starch is treated differently. However, not all cheeses are equally replicable, and the team at KMC is therefore working hard to produce the greatest products for plant-based consumers.

—When working on plant-based cheese we still experience a few issues. One is to improve our spreadable cheeses while another is to create the right stringy plant-based pizza cheese alternative you know from movies, which causes headaches across the industry, says Ole Primholdt Christensen, Business Development Director at KMC.

At KMC the ambitions are high, and the knowledge and experience is growing every day. Their goal is to provide plant-based alternatives to every types of cheese, to eliminate possible limitations to the plant-based diet, while helping the climate.

 

Round-the-clock air conditioning is indispensable in large poultry houses. Even a small variation in the temperature and humidity level can compromise healthy growth from day-old chicken to slaughter. So a lot of energy goes in to maintaining the perfect indoor climate – particularly in countries where outdoor conditions reach the extremes.

That is why Danish ventilation system supplier SKOV decided to test the energy-saving capacity of a new fan on a broiler farm just outside Brisbane, Australia where the summers are both hot and humid. The farm belongs to a long-standing customer with a series of identical houses, each one containing the same poultry breed and employing the same feed and management tools.

SKOV replaced the existing fans in one of the houses with the new BF 50 BlueFan. Due to the higher ventilation capacity, the number of fans could be reduced from 16 to 13. Comparative tests were then run over five broiler batches. The results were clear and the conditions inside the house remained optimal throughout.

BF 50 reduced energy consumption for ventilation by up to 50%

Such an energy-saving improvement means the return-on-investment time can be as little as two years, depending on electricity prices, climatic conditions and other producer-specific factors. The overall rewards are lower energy costs and reduced carbon emissions into the environment.

Many farmers benefit from the use of nitrification inhibitors (NI) to maximise nitrogen availability for sustaining crop growth and reducing nitrate leaching. International studies have also documented the ability of NI to reduce the production of nitrous oxide – a primary source of GHG emissions from agriculture.

Now a research team from Denmark is investigating another important question: the precise climate and environmental effects of NI under Danish conditions.

The objective is to document whether NI can support Danish farmers in reaching their climate goals. Based on initial calculations, potential exists to cut nitrous oxide emissions by at least 400 kt CO₂ equivalents a year.

NI research will provide basis for national recommendations

However, little is currently known about how NI are affected by different soil types, weather patterns, fertiliser and manure types and the practices of the individual farmer. There is similarly little data about the side effects of NI on soil microorganisms and the risk of leaching into surface and ground water.

This is all necessary knowledge before policymakers decide whether to promote NI as a sustainable tool for reducing GHG emissions in Denmark.

Aarhus University, University of Copenhagen and SEGES Innovation are partners in the project which will provide the basis for recommendations to the agricultural industry on NI use. Funding has been provided by the Climate Research Program under the Danish Agricultural Agency.

Can bioactive compounds in Nordic macroalgae be used to limit methane production in cow stomachs? Danish researchers are investigating the possibility in a project to pioneer a new methane-reducing additive for cattle feed.

Initial findings suggest there could be potential to cut cow methane emissions by at least 45% with no negative consequences for productivity, animal health or food safety.

Macroalgae could cut cow methane emissions by 45%

Aarhus University is leading the partnership project, which started out by harvesting and cultivating macroalgae species with known anti-methanogenic properties. From them, a handful of promising compounds are being identified through in vitro simulation.

The ultimate test of the bioactive compounds will be a controlled feeding trial with dairy cows, measuring the impact on methane generation alongside milk production, health and other key parameters.

The plan is to patent and commercialise the additive within five years of the project’s completion in August 2025. As no additive for effective methane reduction is currently available, market demand is expected to be high.

The other partners in the project are Danish Technological Institute, Ocean Rainforest, Lactobio, Novonesis, Vilofoss and DLG.

Short product shelf life is a major sustainability problem for the dairy industry. Once purchased by consumers, a large proportion of fermented products such as yoghurt, sour cream and cottage cheese end up as household waste. The challenge many manufacturers face is how to keep products fresh for longer without resorting to unwanted food additives.

Bioprotective cultures from the Danish ingredient company Novonesis are an effective solution. Drawn from nature, the cultures protect fermented dairy products from spoilage caused by yeast and mould – even when storage and cold chain conditions are difficult.

A longer shelf life minimises waste and protects the brand’s reputation

Ten years after the initial market launch, Novonesis introduced a new generation of bioprotective cultures that offer even better stability at high distribution temperatures and a better sensory fit, so taste and texture are always at their best.

Novonesis has more than 50,000 microbial strains in its collection – an excellent starting point for finding the right strain for every trend, need and sustainability hurdle.

Livestock manure is a primary source of ammonia and methane emissions, leading to a poor indoor climate for pigs and cattle and pollution of the surrounding environment.

Danish farm machinery supplier Lind Jensen Maskinfabrik (LJM) develops and refines manure removal systems to minimise these emissions. As growing environmental legislation drives innovation, farmers can rely on LJM systems to help them comply with the most stringent requirements.

Significant improvements have been made. Although Danish law only requires weekly emptying of the slurry pits under the floor slats in pig barns, LJM’s mechanical scrapers make it easy to empty the pits daily. For cattle barns, LJM has designed an automated scraper system to remove manure from solid floors fast and efficiently 12 times a day.

As barns have grown in size over the years, LJM has developed scraper systems for barn floors up to 250 metres in length.

Frequent manure removal reduces methane emissions by up to 90%

In cattle barns, where manure is scraped from a solid drained floor, a recent study has found a 23% reduction in ammonia evaporation compared to barns with a slatted floor and slurry pit.

LJM has an ongoing collaboration with the agricultural research and development organisation Seges Innovation to evaluate and optimise its systems to ensure they deliver the best possible climate benefits at minimum cost.

 

 

 

Spray drying accounts for up to 70% of the energy requirements in milk powder processing. Until recently, all the heat that goes into the process was released as low-temperature waste. Now GEA has come up with a solution to utilise this heat, reducing fuel consumption and related carbon emissions.

One of the world’s largest food system suppliers, GEA has based its business unit for powder and thermal separation technologies in Denmark. Here, the specialised design team has developed the new air heating system – GEA AddCool – to recover low-temperature waste heat from exhaust air and cooling processes.

GEA AddCool uses high-temperature heat pumps to capture and upgrade the heat, which is then used to pre-warm air to 120°C before it is fed into the spray-drying process. Because it is an add-on system, retrofitting to existing spray dryers is simple. Production throughput and powder quality are unchanged.

Air heating system cuts fuel consumption and emissions by more than 50%

GEA’s patent-pending solution is the result of a five-year collaborative development project involving experts in engineering, heat pumps, spray drying and powder processing. For powder manufacturers, GEA AddCool is an energy-saving milestone that cuts heating needs, costs, and carbon footprint.

The need to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy sources became even more pressing when the war in Ukraine put Europe’s natural gas supplies at risk. At Royal Unibrew, the volatile situation was a fresh reminder that the transition to carbon-neutral production was the right policy for the planet and business.

As a leading multi-beverage company with 19 production sites in nine markets, Royal Unibrew has focused on reducing its climate impact for many years. From 2015 to 2021, for example, energy efficiency improvements cut CO₂ emissions per hectolitre by 28% while production volumes grew 32%. In 2023, the group achieved three important milestones.

At the largest production site in Faxe, Denmark, construction of a solar park was complete.

New solar park covers 40% of plant energy need

A second project at the Faxe site, involved the installation of a heat pump to utilise surplus heat from process cooling systems. The outcome is a 30% reduction in heat consumption.

Thirdly, a bioreactor established at Royal Unibrew’s second largest site in Lahti, Finland, has enabled the conversion from fossil-based to bio-based fuel for heating. The bioreactor runs on production by-products, supported by locally produced biogas.

Additional energy efficiency and renewable energy projects are planned at all other Royal Unibrew sites. The group goal is to become 100 percent carbon-neutral by 2025.

Global demand for protein is expected to double by 2050 due to population growth and rising incomes. Within the food industry, pioneering research is developing new low-carbon protein sources to meet this need without burdening the planet.

For Danish biosolutions company Novonesis, precision fermentation was the obvious starting point for innovation. Used for decades to produce functional enzymes for food and beverages, the technology is now at the heart of the company’s advanced protein solutions.

The outcome is new protein ingredients of similar nutritional quality to the proteins in meat and milk. But, because they are produced by microorganisms in a tank of sugar and water, carbon emissions may decrease immensely. Water consumption and land use could also be reduced by 90 percent.

Carbon emissions from new protein ingredients may be up to 90% lower

At the same time, the strictly controlled process promises to deliver a reliable protein supply, independent of climate change, harvest variations or zoonotic epidemics.

Novonesis has extensive fermentation knowledge to draw on when encoding microorganisms, such as yeast or filamentous fungi, for protein production. The goal is to develop specialised proteins with an optimised amino acid composition or improved taste – meeting the dietary needs of distinct consumer groups or optimising the protein content of a food or beverage brand.

Breeding cows that produce less methane is a promising scenario in the effort to reduce the climate impact of milk production. Since scientists discovered that some cows are genetically inclined to convert more feed into milk and less into methane, this possibility is coming closer to reality.

The Danish cattle breeding company VikingGenetics, owned by Nordic dairy and beef farmers, is playing a lead role in that development by enabling farmers to breed the healthy and efficient cows of the future.

The patented Cattle Feed Intake System (CFIT) is one of the company’s key tools. A smart solution based on 3D cameras and artificial intelligence, CFIT is designed to monitor the feed intake and weight of each cow in commercial herds throughout the lactation period.

VikingGenetics registers the data in the Nordic Saved Feed Index, which describes the genetic ability of each cow to turn feed into milk. The amount of methane produced, varying from two to 12 percent of the feed’s energy content, is closely linked to feed-to- milk efficiency.

Farmers can then use this overview of genetic potential to select the breeding bulls that will pass high feed efficiency and other desirable traits onto the next generation.

By 2025, further planned installations will bring the number of cows up to 30,000

Today, CFIT monitors 12,500 cows across 25 commercial farms. By 2025, further planned installations will bring the number of cows up to 30,000. The collection of data from a larger number of herds in different production systems will speed up the breeding of highly productive, feed-efficient and low-emission cows that also stand out for their good health.

According to a new study based on CFIT data, genetic selection for improved feed efficiency could reduce GHG emissions from dairy cattle in VikingGenetics’ home markets by 20 percent in 2050. In a country like India, for example, the improvement potential is even higher. Here a dairy farmer may reduce methane emissions by 33 percent per litre of milk using Nordic genetics.