Microgeneration Case studies
Green and fresh... Sainsbury’s now has five environmental stores across the UK T
he pressure is on companies to adopt sustainable practices and there is con- siderable support and interest in doing
so – not only for the environmental benefits but also the impact on the bottom line. No matter what size the business, the benefits remain the same but one of the challenges is to understand what tools are available to help business adopt sustainable business practice. Ten years ago, the retail giant Sainsbury’s set out to build the world’s first green super- market. Designed for a Millennium com- petition by Lord Foster, with a range of cutting-edge technologies, including natural refrigerants, rainwater harvesting, a combined heat and power plant and wind turbines, the Greenwich store was born. You can see it for yourself today; it’s on the right as you approach the Blackwall Tunnel from the south of the Thames in London. “We put every bit of green technology we could into that supermarket,” says John Ashford, Sainsbury’s’ head of engineering and sustainability. It was a learning curve for the company. And although it had created a fantastic looking building, which picked up a plethora of architecture, design and environ-
mental awards, the building was not sustain- able. “It wasn’t sustainable because we only ever built one of them.”
The lesson learned at Greenwich was to roll out the design as part of a standard specifica- tion for all new Sainsbury’s stores going for- ward. Today, 85% of the Greenwich design is locked into the standard specification. With 20-30 new shops being built every year, the company needed technology and systems that
“I can build three environmen- tal stores a year. I have to think about simplicity for maintenance teams – that’s the big challenge
were replicable across the country – systems used by different facilities teams. “I do not build signature buildings,” says Ashford. “I need something that is simple, replicable and can be delivered all the time, every time. “I can now build three environmental stores a year. I have to think about simplicity for maintenance teams – that’s the big challenge.” When considering technologies, cost-effec- tiveness is top of Ashford’s priorities. Can the
08 | Sustainable Business | Microgeneration | October 2010
technology be costed and implemented ten, 20 and 30-fold? That is what excites buyers from the big retailers. Currently the company is using large wind turbines (at its Scotland stores, primarily), maximising natural light and natural refrigerants (because 40% of its energy bill comes from refrigeration) and ground source heat pumps. “There is a place for all clean and green technologies – but you have to make it cost effective and simple,” adds Ashford.
Rob Wylie, from WHEB Ventures, which invests in clean tech companies, would like to see a return to companies having their own venture capital arms to invest in technologies they like. “It’s not so much about companies, like Unilever and Sainsbury’s putting money in – more about them teaching inventors how to simplify their products and allowing them to play with them,” he says.
Sainsbury’s now has five environmen- tal stores across the UK. The latest, in Westhoughton, Bolton, is the first to be equipped with ‘clean’ refrigeration and includes Europe’s first biomass generator, using wood pellets to power roughly half of the store’s energy.
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