CHICAGO—PureCircle, a producer and marketer of high-purity stevia products, announced it has cut the carbon footprint of its products by 15 percent since last year and is now a quarter of the way to its 2020 carbon footprint intensity goal. The company has been able to achieve carbon reduction by continuing non-carbon intensive farming and processing practices, optimizing production scale and developing innovative products. As a result in the most recent fiscal year, PureCircle sold enough stevia to enable the food and beverage industry to eliminate close to 40,000 metric tons of greenhouse gas (GHG), which is the annual equivalent of removing 7,000 cars from the road.

“The exciting thing is there’s a real impact when using PureCircle stevia in a product reformulation, say for instance a 30 percent reduced-calorie beverage. Based on BIER (Beverage Industry Environmental Roundtable) industry research, natural caloric sweeteners are the second biggest driver of emissions outside of packaging," said Ajay Chandran, director of corporate sustainability, PureCircle. “In a 30 percent reduced-calorie, naturally sweetened beverage, PureCircle stevia can have a carbon footprint one-fourth or less than benchmark sugar standards. Therefore using stevia to replace other natural caloric sweeteners has an impact not only on the carbon footprint but also the calorie footprint."

The PureCircle carbon footprint was calculated following the GHG Protocol Product Standard, the foremost methodology for product lifecycle analysis of carbon emissions. Elements of the GHG protocol through World Business Council on Sustainability Development and World Resource Institute methodologies were also applied to ensure the methodology met the highest standards possible. To ensure transparency, a third-party organization was employed to calculate the carbon footprint. Calculations were computed by Verco, an independent carbon footprint expert. The footprint was peer reviewed by Marcelle McManus, Ph.D., an environmental impact expert.

PureCircle’s 2020 goals are to reduce its carbon intensity by 20 percent from its 2011 baseline and enable a cumulative reduction of the food and beverage industry’s:

Carbon emissions by 1 million metric tons

Water consumption by 2 trillion liters

Calories in global diets by 13 trillion

To learn more about PureCircle’s 2020 Sustainability Goals, visit: http://purecircle.com/company/corporate-social-responsibility/our-2020-sustainability-goals.