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Senator Schumer Announces $22M Award to Lowville’s
Kraft Heinz Facility for Clean Energy Upgrades
Published: March 25, 2024 at
10:00 a.m.
By: Press Release from Senator Schumer’s Office
FUNDS TO UPGRADE,
ELECTRIFY, & TRANSITION NORTH COUNTRY DAIRY PLANT TO CLEAN ENERGY TO
REDUCE GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS
DOE Is Awarding
Kraft Heinz Up To $170M Total To Upgrade 10
Facilities Across America, Including Lewis County’s, With Heat Pumps
And Other Clean Energy Modernizations, Creating Good Paying Jobs And
Reducing Annual Emissions by 300,000+ Tons of CO2
Schumer Created
Program In The IRA & Infrastructure Laws He
Led To Passage To Boost Projects Like The North Country’s Kraft Heinz
Modernization — Building On His Long History To Strengthen Lowville’s Kraft
Heinz Plant, Which He Helped Save In 2015
Schumer: A
Cleaner and More Prosperous Future For Lowville’s
Kraft Heinz Plant Is Coming Thanks To The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law
& Inflation Reduction Act!
WASHINGTON, DC — U.S.
Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer today announced Kraft Heinz in
Lewis County is expected to receive an estimated $22 million as a part of
an overall $170.9 million award from the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE)
Industrial Demonstrations Program (IDP) to upgrade, electrify, and
decarbonize its heating process to significantly reduce carbon emissions at
ten Kraft Heinz sites across America.
Schumer said this
funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act
will help accelerate the North Country plant’s adoption of clean energy to
lower greenhouse gas emissions and reduce energy costs all while creating
good-paying construction jobs to strengthen the plant boosting the local
economy and environment.
“This is a major
win for Lewis County and our Upstate NY’s dairy industry. Lowville’s Kraft
Heinz plant has long been the cream of the crop and now the Bipartisan
Infrastructure & Jobs Law and Inflation Reduction Act will help power
their transition to clean energy, making sure the North Country facility
will have the modern upgrades it needs to remain the ‘big cheese,’ all
while creating good paying jobs and fighting climate change,” said
Senator Schumer. “Kraft Heinz is helping make their Lowville plant
a national model for how the food industry can transition to clean energy,
lower costs, and strengthen operations, all while creating good
paying jobs and a greener future. I helped save this plant nearly a decade ago, and promised to keep fighting to help it grow ever
since, and now with the federal funding I am delivering today, Lewis
County can keep churning out its globally recognized products stamped ‘Made
Sustainably in Upstate NY’.”
“At Kraft Heinz,
we’re on a journey to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by
2050,” said Pedro Navio, President of North America at Kraft Heinz.
“This investment from the U.S. Department of Energy will give us critical
resources to make cutting-edge technology improvements in our plants,
including our facility in Lowville, NY. Not only will these funds help us
lower emissions, they will create local jobs,
improve training for our current and future workforce, and better the
communities we serve. We’d like to thank Senator Schumer for his
leadership and support over the years.”
Kraft Heinz’s
“Delicious Decarbonization Through Integrated Electrification and Energy
Storage Project” specifically aims to upgrade, electrify, and decarbonize
its process heat at 10 facilities by applying a range of technologies
including heat pumps, electric heaters, and electric boilers in combination
with sustainable fuel boilers, solar thermal, solar panels, and thermal
energy storage.
Implementing
these technologies at each facility is expected to reduce
annual emissions by more than 300,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide per
year, translating to a 99% reduction from 2022 levels for Kraft Heinz, all
while helping create hundreds of good paying construction jobs. At the
Lowville Kraft Heinz plant, the funding will replace aging gas and other
high carbon emitting technologies with more energy efficient and
environmentally friendly alternatives such as heat pumps, electric heaters,
and electric boilers. In addition to the Lowville plant in New York,
Kraft Heinz will also boost their decarbonization efforts in Champaign,
Illinois; Columbia, Missouri; Fremont, Ohio; Holland, Michigan;
Kendallville, Indiana; New Ulm, Minnesota; Muscatine, Iowa; Mason City,
Iowa; and Winchester, Virginia.
Funded by the
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act, which Schumer
led to passage as Majority Leader, the Department
of Energy’s Industrial Demonstrations Program (IDP) funds projects
that focus on the highest emitting and hardest to abate industries where
decarbonization technologies can have the greatest impact: iron and steel,
cement and concrete, chemicals and refining, food and beverage, paper and
forest products, aluminum, other energy-intensive manufacturing industries
and cross-cutting technologies. The program aims to accelerate
decarbonization projects in energy-intensive industries and provide
American manufacturers a competitive advantage in the race to lead the
world in low- and net-zero carbon manufacturing.
Schumer has a
long history of supporting Kraft Heinz in Lowville, personally saving the
plant from closing in November 2015. Schumer’s
advocacy resulted in an agreement had been reached to save at-risk
Kraft-Heinz facilities. After securing the deal, Schumer
also personally visited the Lowville plant to speak to workers,
management and local leaders about the future and new employment
opportunities at the company and plant.
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