I Scream, You Scream, Unilever Screams For an Eco-Friendly Ice Cream


Did you know something as simple as a pint of the sweetest, creamiest, most chocolaty Rocky Road ice cream can use a vast amount of energy to keep it frozen? Luckily, Unilever, in an effort to minimize their environmental impact, is working on creating an innovative take-home and freeze-yourself ice cream. Yeah!

Unquestionably and for obvious reasons ice cream needs to be kept frozen at all times (except as it melts by the spoonful in your mouth) So, to keep it frozen it takes a vast amount of energy to transport and store ice cream. This creates a lot of greenhouse gas emissions. Since Unilever is no small corporation, it is the world's largest maker of ice cream (they own a lot of the well known ice cream brands like: Popsicle, Ben & Jerry's, Wall's, Magnum, Breyer's, Good Humor, and more) their environmental impact is significant and is harming the environment as well as costing Unilever a lot in energy costs.

In an effort to reduce their environmental impact Unilever has ongoing research in it's own laboratories with Cambridge University to find a low carbon solution for the transportation and storage of ice cream. The idea is to create an ice cream that keeps well at room temperature, but can then be taken home and frozen, a freeze-at-home low-carbon ice cream.

Finding a way to reduce the emissions it takes to keep ice cream frozen doesn't prove to be easy though. Instead of finding more energy efficient refrigerators (ex. solar power) and transportation (hybrid vehicles) Unilever has taken on a mission to find a way to store their ice cream so that it can be kept at room temperature until the customer takes it home where he will then take it home and freeze it.

If you are wondering: Will this low carbon ice cream taste the same as its replacement? Will it still have the same texture? I like mine creamy. Will it last long enough? Will it cost more? Will it really be better for the environment? I'm sure Unilever is wondering the same things too. After all they are a business and they have to be able to sell their product to the customers to stay in business.

What does this mean for Unilever? If they succeed and if their customers take to the new eco-friendly ice cream, it means they deserve a pat on the pack for doing their part for the environment, but it also means more money in their pocket book. It's a win win earth-friendly and super yummy situation.


 Via Trendhunter and Ecogeek and Times In London

