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Whole Foods Market to cut energy consumption 25%

Whole Foods Market is offsetting its electricity consumption by buying renewable energy credits from wind farms, but is considering developing its own on-site wind turbines

Organic food retailer Whole Foods Market has announced a plan to cut its energy consumption by 25% per square foot by 2015.

The company, which has its HQ in Austin, Texas, has been supporting wind energy projects through the purchase of renewable energy credits for the past three years, and as well as continuing this strategy said it will make its stores more efficient.

New stores are being designed to be more energy efficient, with Colorado’s South Glenn store using roughly 35% less energy than two older stores nearby in its first few months and the Santa Barbara store in California using 45% less energy than a comparable store.

Existing stores are being retrofitted to include smarter refrigeration systems, low-energy lighting and control systems as well as advanced heating and air conditioning systems.

Kathy Loftus, Whole Foods Market global leader of sustainable engineering and energy management, said: “After initial metering results led us to estimate that energy reductions may be close to 20 million kWh over the past two years, we were motivated to earmark $10 million over the next 18 months for additional retrofit and upgrade projects.”

NREL

Whole Foods has been working with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory as part of a Retail Energy Alliance partnership with the US Department of Energy to test and develop more efficient buildings.

The aim of that work is to design a building that is 50% more efficient than current efficiency codes require.

Michael Deru, NREL Senior Engineer, said: “The goal is to transfer the knowledge gained from these projects to help transform the designs across all buildings to help Whole Foods Market and other retailers transform how buildings are built and operated.”

Generation

Meanwhile, the retailer is looking to generate more of its own energy on-site, with is stores in Glastonbury, Connecticut and Dedham Massachusetts already using fuel cells to provide their power, Whole Foods’ store in San Jose is to follow suit with a fuel cell to provide 90% of its power, and more fuel cells are planned.

Fuel cells are generally run on natural gas or hydrogen, but in decentralized locations offer more efficient generation than conventional power plants. Whole Foods has been working with Connecticut firm UTC Power to source its fuel cell systems.

The retailer said it is also testing the feasibility of on-site clean energy projects like wind turbines and waste-to-energy facilities.

The remainder of its electricity consumption is being offset through the purchase of renewable energy credits from wind farm operators, which are being purchased via San Francisco company 3Degrees. This year, Whole Foods expects to buy 810,000 megawatt-hours of credits.

Whole Foods is also seeking to cut the environmental footprint of its distribution network, and has reduced truck deliveries by more than two million miles through improved logistical planning alone, cutting fuel consumption by 360,000 gallons a year.

Its Atlanta-area distribution center uses the South Region’s spent cooking oil to supply fuel for its trucks, and eliminates more than 250,000 pounds of emissions per year.