Starch Europe fully supports the EU Green Deal objective of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. The main input costs for EU starch producers are, first and foremost, the cost of the agricultural raw material, and second,  the cost of the energy consumed during extraction and processing.

For economic, as well as environmental reasons, therefore, starch producers seek to ensure that starch production plants are as energy efficient as possible. It is for this reason that almost all EU starch plants now use high efficiency Combined Heat and Power Generation (CHP) systems, which offer energy savings ranging between 15-40% when compared to the supply of energy and heat from conventional power stations and boilers.

The EU starch industry was also one of the first agri-food sectors to conduct a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) study for all its products, first in 2001 and more recently and using the most updated and robust methodologies, in 2012 and 2015. This not only reflects our mission to assure a reliable supply of safe starch-based ingredients but also responds to the increasing demand for this type of information from our customers and our joint desire to ensure that this information is being provided in a consistent manner.

As a major energy user, the EU starch industry closely follows all EU legislation which impacts the cost of the energy it uses, notably the Energy Efficiency Directive and the Emission Trading Scheme, and seeks to ensure that the Starch Industry’s position and views are understood and incorporated in an effort to ensure that the ingredients produced by the sector are not left at a competitive disadvantage against imported products with which they compete, .