To transform consumption and waste management practices they will look at water cycle management, waste management, sustainable agriculture and energy efficiency.
Priorities include securing access to water resources and sustainable management of plastic packaging.
Danone’s climate policy calls for a zero net carbon footprint by 2050 for sites under the company’s direct, shared and expanded responsibility.
Emmanuel Faber, Danone CEO, said: “By teaming up with Veolia, we are ensuring a secure source of strategic resources and optimizing their utilization, since our climate policy is an integral part of our mission and our business.”
Specific projects have been identified in France and other countries for the alliance to be rolled out company-wide at Danone in 2016.
Deployment will be ‘gradual’, it said, building on lessons learned in a first round of pilot projects.
Some projects involve developing “zero liquid discharge” plants to ensure optimum recycling of water resources, and the creation of production units for recycled plastic to secure supply source.
Others include producing biogas by combining factory bio-waste with manure from local farms and optimizing energy consumption by making expert use of alternative energy sources.
Antoine Frérot, chairman and CEO of Veolia, said: “We are working with Danone to help them reach their 2020 goals while benefiting from major scope for business development. Our expertise is being invested to optimize water, waste and energy management across all of their processes.”