Skyven Technologies, an Energy-as-a-Service company, and California Dairies, Inc. (CDI), a milk marketing and processing cooperative co-owned by nearly 400 dairy farming families, have successfully implemented six decarbonizing projects at two of CDI’s largest facilities. The projects, designed to increase energy efficiency and reduce emissions without affecting operations, will help CDI reach its carbon neutrality goals by 2050.
The projects include two large solar thermal systems for industrial process heat, which utilize smart steam trap solutions with internet-connected sensors to reduce steam loss at each facility. The integrations also include boiler heat recovery systems to boost boiler efficiency by nearly 10%.
So far, Skyven’s solutions have saved the CDI facilities over 3,500 metric tons of CO2 and over 65,000 MMBtu of natural gas, the equivalent of removing over 780 gasoline-powered cars from the road annually. The solutions are expected to save over 4,700 metric tons of CO2 and more than 89,000 MMBtu of natural gas in a full year of operation.
"Skyven has played a key role in our mission to create more sustainable dairy products for a healthy world," said Darrin Monteiro, Vice President of Sustainability and Member Relations at California Dairies. "Skyven's ability to design and implement these successful solutions with no cost and no interruption to our process was a vital component to success."
To support the projects, Skyven and CDI leveraged:
- Grant funding from the California Energy Commission’s Food Production Investment Program
- Utility incentive funding from Pacific Gas & Electric and Southern California Gas Company
- Third-party project financing
- Investments from Skyven’s balance sheet
These funding opportunities and the subsequent energy savings that the projects have created allowed CDI to implement these decarbonizing technologies without any capital investment.
