Benchmarking of supermarket energy consumption

Energy consumption data for supermarket stores have been obtained and compared with data from other studies. Correlations and trends from the data have been analysed to investigate what influences energy consumption in a retail store. Energy consumption of the supermarkets was well correlated with both sales floor and total floor area. Once floor area was taken into account, there was no difference in energy consumption between different store types. There was a positive correlation with store age and hours open, however, it was much smaller than those for floor area. The mean specific energy consumption (SEC) of the data set was 566 kWh.m2.year-1 based on electrical energy consumption and sales floor area. This rose to 759 kWh.m2.year-1 when gas was included. From other studies the SEC varied from 407 to 1700 kWh.m2.year-1 based on electrical energy consumption.