The Cold Chain Federation (CCF) has published its Cold Chain Energy Access Crisis Action Plan, that outlines measures that it claims, if enacted by government, will reduce the financial pressures on the supply chain caused by energy shortages.

According to the CCF, temperature-controlled storage and distribution businesses are being hit by multiple huge cost increases and fear worse to come.

In addition to advocating the immediate extension of any price cap or other market intervention to all businesses in the food supply chain, the Action Plan includes longer-term measures that the CCF claims will support the food industry’s transition to “sustainable, resilient and green power.”

Energy Access Action Plan includes:

• Extend any price cap or other market intervention to all businesses in the food supply chain
• Ensure food supply chain is a priority industry for supply in the event of hopefully unlikely shortages this winter
• Fast track planning applications for midscale renewables, especially wind and subsidise connection costs
• Increase access to Renewable Energy Generation and Storage Installation Grants/ Loans
• Extend energy efficiency incentives for energy intensive businesses through the Climate Change Agreement scheme
• Transition to demand response and fully incentivise intensive industries that can play a role in grid balancing.

Rising costs

Cold Chain Federation president Tim Moran said that the cold chain is being “buffeted on all sides by the inflation crisis.”

He said: “Keeping food cold is energy intensive in its very nature, and the cost of electricity for cold storage has at least doubled already and is going higher. Add the cost of diesel, wages and equipment and across both the storage and the distribution of fresh and frozen food, our industry is experiencing increases far beyond what we can absorb. 

“We are a very resilient industry, but we are very concerned about the coming months.”

Moran said that it was “very short-sighted” of government to think only about the direct cost of energy to domestic consumers. He said: “An energy price cap for food industry businesses is essential to tackling food price inflation.”

He added: “Looking to food chain resilience in the medium and longer term, we are urging government to work with us to accelerate the transition to a new kind of electricity network where businesses like cold stores are not just users of powers, but generators and stores of energy as part of a more resilient, greener infrastructure.

The CCF’s Cold Chain Live! Conference takes place across two days, from Monday 8th to Tuesday 9th September, and brings together cold chain industry leaders with parliamentarians and academics to discuss the future of the industry.

At the conference, CCF president Moran is set to urge government to help curb further food inflation by implementing an energy price cap for businesses in the food industry.

The conference will also hear from speakers including Lord Deben, chairman of the UK’s independent Committee on Climate Change and former Secretary of State for the Environment; and Harld Peters, president Europe of Lineage Logistics.