by Brianna Crandall — March 18, 2011—RLtec has signed a deal with U.K. supermarket chain Sainsbury’s to use its “green” smart grid technology in over 200 Sainsbury’s stores. Under the world’s first commercial deal of its kind, RLtec will fit its “dynamic demand” technology to the supermarket’s heating and ventilation systems, helping to better manage electricity supply and demand across the entire national grid as well as boosting Sainsbury’s energy efficiency.
The 10-year deal follows a successful trial of the technology at three Sainsbury’s stores in the Southeast and is expected to save 10,000 metric tons of carbon a year. The roll out of this technology will also provide the grid with significant cost savings.
Dynamic demand works by managing the power consumption of equipment, responding automatically to second-by-second changes in the balance between supply and demand on the grid, explains RLtec. As a result, the CO2-producing power stations that are currently held in reserve to perform this balancing service will not be needed as much, so U.K. emissions can be dramatically reduced, says the company.
Appliances such as refrigerators and heating and ventilation systems switch off and on throughout the day, and RLtec’s technology merely changes the timing of these switchings to match demand on the grid. If widely deployed it could save two million metric tons of CO2 per year in the U.K. alone, claims the company.
