How supermarkets are staying cool in a warmer world

The UK Met Office recently confirmed that climate change is causing a dramatic increase in the frequency of temperature extremes and the number of temperature records the country experiences.

This isn’t just a local issue — data suggests that globally, temperatures reached unprecedented highs this July, marking the hottest month ever recorded.

These rising temperatures are putting pressure on a variety of industries, from energy and transportation to agriculture, and preparing for the summer months is becoming a top priority.

For food retailers, the challenge is particularly unique. As an industry already operating on tight margins, supermarkets must keep perishable produce cool and in optimal conditions even while outside temperatures soar.

At the same time, they need to combat skyrocketing energy costs and prevent equipment breakdowns as cooling systems are forced to work harder in the heat.

To meet these challenges, food retailers are turning to advanced digital technologies. These innovations can improve energy efficiency, reduce the risk of catastrophic machine failures, and ensure optimum conditions for fresh produce, all while minimising food waste.

Fresh, safe, and available

For food retailers, keeping produce fresh, safe, and available for consumers is a top priority. This is especially challenging during heatwaves when warmer conditions increase the risk of spoilage and force refrigeration systems to work overtime to maintain the ideal conditions.

In such scenarios, traditional methods have fallen short, making it clear that precision and control are key.

Digital solutions, such as IoT (Internet of Things), have the potential to overcome these challenges, by providing unparalleled visibility and control over the critical equipment in a supermarket, such as the refrigeration systems and HVAC units.

By mining and monitoring millions of raw, real-time data points from these machines, advanced solutions can then analyse the data, detect inefficiencies, predict potential failures, and make automatic adjustments to ensure optimum conditions for produce.

Take refrigeration, for example. Traditionally, the complex nature of managing vast amounts of refrigeration equipment meant all products were chilled to the lowest temperature required by the most sensitive items, like meat.

This one-size-fits-all approach led to unnecessary energy use and often compromised the quality of less sensitive items. Now, with digital technology that integrates third-party data such as merchandising systems, retailers can tailor refrigeration temperatures to the specific needs of each product type, ensuring maximum freshness and minimising waste.

This level of precise, micro-control over operations not only enhances food quality but also drives significant reductions in food waste. It is this unique ability to combine granular control with macro-level outcomes that provides retailers with a robust and resilient approach to machine management, even during the most challenging conditions like heat waves.

Ensuring energy efficiency

Integrating digital technology into retail infrastructure can significantly reduce unnecessary and costly energy consumption, helping to protect retailers’ bottom lines. During periods of extreme heat, cooling equipment consumes more energy as it works harder to maintain regulated temperatures.

Research from Imperial College, London shows that a 2ºC increase in average summer temperatures will lead to a 6% rise in an estate’s refrigeration energy consumption  over the summer months. This highlights the critical need for energy efficiency in food retail operations.

Significant energy efficiencies can be gained and sustained by deploying IoT software to collect and make sense of hundreds of thousands of data points from machines, controls, and systems across entire retail estates.

Such technology can offer powerful solutions by contextualising this data with other connected systems to gain visibility and precise control over machines, allowing them to optimise the machines, as well as the schedules and processes these systems run.

For example, lighting and HVAC systems can be automatically adjusted based on store hours or weather conditions, significantly reducing energy consumption during off-hours or lower temperatures to limit costs.

The real-time data generated by interconnected assets supports a comprehensive and holistic energy management strategy. During warmer months, when refrigeration units are under increased stress, additional load-shedding capabilities can be implemented. This means energy can be strategically redistributed from less critical units, such as those storing beverages, to crucial units that require more power and lower temperatures, like those preserving fresh produce.

By using these advanced digital strategies, retailers not only optimise energy use but also ensure that their operations remain resilient and efficient, even in the face of rising temperatures.

Mitigating breakdown

Leveraging data and IoT technology provides a significant maintenance advantage, especially during heatwaves when cooling systems must work harder and are more prone to faults and failures. In these high-stress conditions, machines are under greater strain, making the risk of breakdowns and energy inefficiencies higher.

By continuously monitoring cooling assets for incremental changes, IoT solutions can identify and alert when an asset performance deviates from ideal conditions and is demonstrating behaviours of a fault or failure.

When performance issues are identified, advanced solutions can immediately and automatically adjust the system to maintain ideal operating conditions, preventing negative outcomes such as increased energy consumption or spoilage of valuable stock. If these automated adjustments do not – or cannot – resolve the issue, the system will promptly alert an engineer to take further action.

This approach to early fault detection and swift intervention is crucial in preventing catastrophic machine breakdowns. It shifts retailers from a reactive maintenance model to a predictive one, enabling them to address issues before they escalate. By catching problems early, retailers can maintain operational efficiency, reduce the risk of costly downtime, and protect their business from the adverse effects of equipment failure.

Heat waves vs Innovation 

Heat waves pose significant challenges for food retailers, including soaring energy bills, increased risk of equipment breakdowns, and the threat of food spoilage due to compromised conditions. These issues demand robust solutions to protect both business operations and product safety and quality.

However, retailers are rising to the occasion with impressive innovation and resilience and by embracing cutting-edge digital technologies, they are not only addressing the immediate challenges of higher temperatures but also transforming their operations for long-term sustainability. These advancements enable food retailers to improve cost and energy efficiency, enhance operational reliability, and reduce food waste, proving that with the right tools, they can thrive even in the face of extreme heat.

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