Sweden. Lantmännen ekonomisk förening

The 5-year-maturity environmental loan totalling SEK 500 million will be used for financing Lantmännen ekonomisk förening’s (Lantmännen) investment in a new ethyl alcohol production line in close connection to its existing plant in Norrköping. The new line will increase the production of car fuels based on corn/cereals four-fold to 210,000 cubic metres a year. The market for ethyl alcohol for vehicles is expected to expand in the coming years. Lantmännen’s agroetanol plant in Norrköping, is the sole large-scale producer of ethyl alcohol for vehicles in Sweden. Lantmännen is one of the major companies in the food, energy and agriculture sectors in Northern Europe, active in 19 countries with 12,000 people employed in all parts of the value chain “from earth to table.”

The investment in a new plant for the production of ethyl alcohol will help achieve a substantial reduction of emissions of greenhouse gases and decrease the need for importing fossil fuels in Sweden. The investment will also reduce import of protein for animal feed. The use of ethanol decreases the amount of fossil CO2 emitted to the atmosphere. The CO2 emitted from the combustion of ethanol can be regarded as “green” CO2 that is part of the renewable CO2 cycle. The expansion of the production has received the necessary environmental permit by the county administrative board. The Agroetanol plant, together with its suppliers, works on minimising any potential environmental issues connected to the production of the crops used as raw materials and is taking steps to eliminate the runoff from its operations in order to fulfil environmental requirements. The project in its entirety qualifies as an environmental investment.