The ‘A Festive Feast of Renewables’ report placed a focus on food and beverage companies that are producing their goods using renewable energy.

Among those listed was Stawell’s Nectar Farms project. 

“This report is important because Australians, especially younger generations, are becoming increasingly interested in knowing where their food is coming from and whether it has been sustainably produced,” food literacy advocate Alice Zaslavsky said.

Read more: Promising signs for Nectar Farms

Nectar Farms is an extremely unique project, relying solely on renewable energy to run the glasshouse project.

“It was a bizarre situation because we couldn’t get on the (power) grid so we had no other option than to go renewable,” Nectar Farms chief executive Stephen Sasse said.

Climate Council chief executive Amanda McKenzie said projects such as Nectar Farms are crucial for the future of the environment. 

“The solutions are here now and it is wonderful to think that in the lead up to the holidays, Australian families can use their purchasing power to help tackle climate change,” she said.

Nectar Farms is still more than 12 months away from producing fruit or vegetables, but is slowly chipping away in the long process.

“We lodged our planning application last Friday and we don’t envisage any issues to come from that,” Mr Sasse said.

“That will be about a six or seven week process and by the end of February is the financial close. By mid-March we will have confirmation of the funding that is in place.

“If that all goes to plan we expect to be on site by the end of March.”

Mr Sasse said they have a long-term goal of producing “by the end of the second quarter in 2020”.

“Once we are on site early next year it will be all hands on deck to get it all together,” he said.