COLUMBIA, S.C. — Food Lion is seeing a “slight energy savings” from a cascade carbon dioxide refrigeration system used in a store here that opened last December, said Wayne Rosa, energy and maintenance manager for the Salisbury, N.C.-based chain.
As a result, Food Lion is expecting a payback of about 20 years for its investment in the system, from Hill Phoenix, Conyers, Ga. “The incremental cost of the CO2 technology at this point leads to a pretty lengthy payback,” he said.
The cascade system is a blend of a conventional DX system (for low-temperature cases) and a secondary system (for medium-temperature), with carbon dioxide as the cooling agent circulating though display cases for both. The system uses a relatively small amount of HFC refrigerant (R-407A).
Food Lion also has a cascade system, from Kysor Warren, running in a store in Columbus, Ga., and plans to open a store in Conyers, Ga., with a cascade system “with some slight enhancements to the installation in Columbia, but the systems are basically the same,” Rosa said.
Susan Sollenberger, Food Lion’s director of equipment, purchasing, maintenance and energy, said the chain is “still learning” about cascade systems. Moreover, if the federal government decides to regulate HFC refrigerants — which some observers believe may happen in energy legislation under consideration — Food Lion will “at least be familiar” with systems that use lower amounts of HFCs than conventional systems, she said.
Price Chopper Supermarkets, Schenectady, N.Y. is using a cascade system in a store in Saratoga, N.Y. Cascade systems are more common in Europe.
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