The Golden Gate Wholesale Produce Market has announced a major plan to renovate the facility by making a series of infrastructure, environmental, food safety, traffic and sustainability improvements.
State-of-the-art enhancements to be made over the next year include new solar/energy efficiency upgrades, cold chain food storage management, and worker safety systems, as well as smoother traffic flow within the facility, which is a mile from San Francisco International Airport on Highway 101.
Peter Carcione, president of the Golden Gate Produce Market, said, “This investment in the market expands our capability to bring the highest-quality fruits, vegetables, and organics to serve the diverse tastes of the region, and it builds on our long history of supporting California’s agriculture industry in a sustainable manner.”
The 742,000-square-foot facility in South San Francisco employs 475 workers and is open to the public. Twenty-three independent and family-owned businesses operate at the market, including wholesalers, jobbers, commission merchants, brokers, foodservice distributors, processors, and one restaurant. More than 15 million packages move through the market each year.
•Installation of solar panels to be completed before the end of 2016 that will dramatically reduce the market’s need to draw energy from the power grid
•A new recycling/composting partnership with South San Francisco Scavenger to further reduce waste
•Upgraded electrical, water, and sewage systems
•Improved traffic flow within the facility
•A number of worker safety upgrades, including better lighting and loading dock safeguards
•Improved cold chain storage management to ensure quality, freshness, and food safety
•A makeover of the building’s exterior, including new signage and expanded parking
The market’s new 1,322-kilowatt solar installation is expected to generate more than 2,015,648 kilowatt-hours of electricity each year. Use of a similar amount of conventional energy generated using fossil fuels would create greenhouse gases equal to that of 127 homes, 293 cars, or the burning of 1.4 million pounds of coal annually, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.
See www.goldengateproduceterminal.com or call 650-583-4886 for further details.
