CHIP manufacturer McCain Foods GB Ltd chipped in with some good green advice at the launch of a new North Yorkshire Green Business Club on the east coast.

Bill Bartlett, the company’s corporate affairs director, told the York and North Yorkshire Chamber of Commerce meeting how a £20 million investment during the last four years is helping the Scarborough-based business combat energy inflation and reduce its carbon footprint. He said a series of green measures, including a windfarm and wastewater treatment plant to generate energy at the company’s biggest UK factory at Whittlesey, near Peterborough, had reduced carbon emissions by 17,000 tonnes a year.

Mr Bartlett was invited to speak at the meeting at the Crown Spa Hotel, Scarborough, by the York-based North Yorkshire Green Business Club, which is supported by Yorkshire Forward programme Co2Sense Yorkshire and the European Regional Development Fund.

He said: “Since March 2009 we have reduced the electricity needed in the cold stores at our Scarborough site by more than 70 per cent and our CO2 emissions by 72 tonnes a year, by switching to 94W LED bulbs from 400W sun-lamps,” he said.

For more details on North Yorkshire Green Business Club, phone Louise Woollen on 01904 554638.