ACCIONA renews the electricity supply contract with Unilever in Spain

ACCIONA Energía has strengthened its supply of renewable energies to corporate clients with the renewal of its contract to cover the high-voltage consumption of the multinational company Unilever in Spain for the whole of 2019.

The contract with the company that specialises in food and household products envisages the delivery of around 18 gigawatt-hours (GWh) during the year, with the aim of covering all the electricity consumption of the company’s work units in Spain. These include Unilever’s sauce factory in Leioa (Bizkaia) and the company’s offices in Viladecans (Barcelona).

Like all the energy marketed by ACCIONA, supplies to Unilever are certified 100% renewable by the Spanish National Markets and Competition Commission (CNMC). The use of clean energy at the levels indicated will avoid the emission to the atmosphere of around 11,500 tonnes of CO₂ from thermal power plants, the main cause of climate change, under the Spanish energy mix.

This is the second successive year that ACCIONA will supply renewable electricity to Unilever in Spain, having also won the contract for 2018.

Ana Palencia, Sustainability Director of Unilever España, highlighted the effort made by the company in recent years to drive sustainability in its production centres: “In five years, the company has managed to reduce CO₂ emissions in the Hellmann’s sauce factory in Leioa by 38%. For us, the agreement with ACCIONA represents a new push in that direction”.

An expanding activity

ACCIONA Energía, the leading retailer of exclusively renewable energy in Spain, has more than five hundred companies and institutions from a wide range of sectors in its present or long-standing client portfolio, for example, Telefónica, Adif, Navantia, RTVE, Agrolimen, Freixenet, Bimbo, Merck and Basf. This year the company expects to go beyond 6 terawatts-hour (TWh) contracted with large clients in the Iberian Peninsula market.

Outside the Iberian Peninsula the company is also an active marketer of renewable energy to corporate clients. It has signed long-term agreements under the PPA (power purchase agreement) modality with major companies such as Google, Falabella, LATAM Airlines and ENAMI (all in Chile) and Cemex (Mexico).

The supply of renewable energy to the corporate sector is clearly an expanding activity, in the sense that more and more companies are seeking to improve the sustainability of their businesses and reduce their energy consumption. Renewable energy sources such as wind or photovoltaic solar are very attractive because they offer a range of benefits simultaneously: control of energy cost, a smaller carbon footprint and a better reputation and image for the brand.