UK catching up in CO₂ supermarket refrigeration

The UK is becoming one of the main active countries in Europe for CO₂ commercial refrigeration. For the supermarket special, R744.com is giving an overview of best practices as well as new developments in Great Britain’s supermarkets and highlights the pioneers that won ”rac Industry Awards” for environmental achievement.

Main UK players in the field of CO₂ supermarket installations are Sainsbury, Marks & Spencer and Tesco. All three retailers have announced significant changes towards environmentally friendly refrigeration using R744 for their new stores.

• Sainsbury's: UK-based food retailer Sainsbury's is planning to switch to CO₂ refrigeration in all stores by 2030 and has earmarked the first 135 stores for conversion by 2014. From 2010 on, all major new Sainsbury's developments will use CO₂ refrigeration as standard. This single move will reduce the company's carbon footprint by around a third.
• Marks & Spencer: Aiming to progressively reduce total refrigeration greenhouse gas emissions, from 2010 all new installations by UK food retailer Marks & Spencer will use eco-friendly CO₂ systems wherever possible.
• Tesco: The UK retailer has announced plans to install 20-30 systems new CO₂ transcritical systems in the period 2010/2011, and 150 by 2012. CO₂ becoming the mainstream refrigeration solution is being enabled by the development of a standard CO₂ transcritical plant that could be easily rolled out across the Tesco estate, a result of two years of intensive work by Tesco and Star Refrigeration. The standard modules will enable CO₂ to become the mainstream refrigeration solution. The system by Star has already been installed at the world’s first zero-carbon store, the Tesco Store at Ramsey, Cambridgeshire, which is in fact completely HFC-free.

The rac Cooling Industry Awards 2009

The award aims to recognise the excellence in environmentally aware cooling and obviously CO₂ products and services should not be missing in the list of awardees. The list presented in the rac magazine indeed recognises also the environmental and energy-efficient advantages of CO₂ for the UK market:

Star Refrigeration: Having already won numerous rac awards over the years, the company has been honoured with the “contractor of the year” award for its “ground-breaking installations and pioneering approach to the use of natural refrigerants”. Their continuous work in transcritical CO₂ applications as well as new projects such as testing a spiral freezer, which combines the CO₂ technology with magnetic refrigeration techniques have been mentioned.

Tesco: The UK retailers was honoured with the “Green End-User of the Year: Large Projects” award for developing with Star a standard transcritical CO₂ plant for retail applications.

Johnson Controls: Winner in the category “Installation of the Year: Industrial/Commercial”, JC has been awarded for its installation in the Pukka Pie plant based on R744 and NH3. Potential energy savings of 2225,000kWh a year as well as 13,000 tonne savings in CO₂ convinced the pie and sausage maker to change from HCFC system to the new system.

In addition, the company’s contracting team was shortlisted as rac Contractor of the Year, for its work as part of a team delivering turnkey solutions in natural refrigeration systems.

Emerson Retail Services: The leading provider of services for supermarket operators is finalist for the best training initiative, recognising its efforts for developing a training programme for CO₂ installations and use in Marks & Spencer shops. The programme specially designed for the retailer supported design and consultancy firm Oaksmere in the CO₂ maintenance.

Andy Campbell, Tesco: Highly commended in the “Environmental Pioneer”- category, Andy Campbell has been given a special mention as someone who has the “combination of vision, drive and nerve to turn the retail CO₂ concept into reality, […].

Arctic Circle: Finalist for “Environmental Refrigeration Product of the Year”, Arctic Circle’s Eco-connect range has been recognised as a promising modular approach to CO₂ equipment to suit the needs of every site. The base pack can be expanded to feature heat recovery, ambient rejecter or cascade condenser options.

Morrisons: The supermarket chain was a finalist as “Green-End-User of the year” for large projects for its programme of CO₂ systems. Morrisons has announced to have more stores refrigerated by CO₂ than any other rival in the UK. The initial rollout of 30 stores will save 36,700kWh per year and a potential reduction in system leaks of 1,800 tonnes of carbon per site.