P&G's French distribution centre at Amiens, developed together with the ASDA/Wal-Mart subsidiary Gazely, is a site P&G is proud of.
It is the biggest conventional distribution centre in Western Europe, covering over 55,000 square meters within a 93,000 square meter plot and boasting enough capacity to store and handle up to 70,000 pallets of multi-category P&G products.
Beyond that, though, it is also home to a number of energy-saving innovations, including, for example:
- Solar panels for hot water supplies and photovoltaic cells for energy production.
- A wind turbine producing up to 10 per cent of the energy needed on site.
- Translucent roof panels to allow natural light to be used in place of artificial illumination, creating energy savings of up to 30 per cent.
- Energy-efficient fluorescent lighting with daylight dimming and motion detection, creating a 70 per cent energy saving compared to traditional lighting.
- Forklift trucks with alternating current regenerative motors, which allow the battery to be recharged whenever the mast comes down, saving up to 30 per cent of the energy used by traditional fork lifts.
- Wood frames for roof trusses, docks doors and other structures. These store carbon dioxide, unlike traditional concrete frames, which create the gas when they are being made, resulting in a saving of about 3,030 tonnes of CO2.
In addition, P&G is currently looking into giving its forklifts carbon-neutral hydrogen fuel cells.
The P&G Fabric Care and Home Care plant nearby even blows its own plastic bottles. Previously, the site used a contractor to make the bottles, which then had to be trucked a long distance for delivery.
Now the plant brings in plastic granules instead, eliminating nearly half a million miles of truck travel and five tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. Production costs have also gone down since there is no longer a need to store empty bottles.