Take our user survey and make your voice heard.
On Nov 1, Lawson opened a new store in chilly Akita Prefecture. Nothing particularly surprising about this. However, this store in Yurihonjo will have some rather unique features.
In addition to solar panels, improved insulation, and LED light bulbs, this branch will also be testing out some new environmentally friendly features: Saving winter snow for summer air conditioning and using sunlight to heat the store.
The company has recently made a move to be more environmentally friendly, primarily by cutting energy usage.
In the illustration at left, you can clearly see the massive snow saver in the back and solar panels on the roof. With the new features, Lawson expects the new branch to use half as much electricity as it would have in 2010. But how?
Their plan is surprisingly simple but not necessarily easy – or cheap to start with.
The major point is that the company will be collecting and storing snow over the winter. The storage unit is nearly 100 cubic meters in volume and apparently will be able to preserve the snow without using any electricity thanks to some miraculous insulation. In the summer, the snow will be used to air condition the store by running water through pipes routed through the container.
For those worried about staying warm this winter, Lawson has a rather novel way of keeping warm as well. Pipes are installed under the store floor, and water heated by the sun will be pumped through the pipes. Though floor heating isn’t exactly new, we thought it was pretty clever of them to use solar-heated water. However, it looks like this will only be used behind the counter, so you’ll have to be an employee to experience the joy of sun-warmed toes.
Both of these features are the first in the industry, giving Lawson some excellent ecological bragging rights. There is one drawback though: Initial setup costs for the store are twice as much as a regular store. According to their website, a Lawson store costs around 3,075,000 yen to set up, though this seems to be for already-constructed buildings. It’s hard to say how much it would cost if this is an entirely new building, though we imagine it’s not cheap.
In addition to these new features, the store will also be fitted with solar panels, insulated windows, a geothermal heat pump, high-quality wall and roof insulation, LED light bulbs, energy-efficient freezers and refrigerators, and other energy-saving devices.
While this is only a test store for now, if the energy-saving features work as hoped, they plan to start using them far and wide.
Sources: Lawson, Sankei News, Sponichi
Read more stories from RocketNews24. -- Foreign Employee Named Lawson Working at Lawson Convenience Store -- Japan’s original eco-friendly house -- Lawson gives you a taste of Japan’s prefectures with their new premium roll cakes
© RocketNews24
9 Comments
Login to comment
ControlFreak
Imagine how much sun light they could gather if they put solar collectors over the parking areas.
Also, its too bad they did not put the refrigerators and freezers in a separate area that basically uses the outside temperature in winter to keep cool. Its rather silly when you think about it, but they heat the store for the customers and the fridges and freezers have to now fight that heat to keep stuff cold. Warm and cold areas should be separated. In fact, it might be economical to use the stored snow to keep the fridges and freezers cold.
sf2k
^ ControlFreak, the geothermal heat pump, basically a ground source heat pump will manage the thermal changes in the building. Heat and cold will produce a useful thermosyphon effect
Although the initial costs are higher the long term effect is that the building is more resilient and not requiring as much external power to operate. If it's operations could be over 100% efficient, meaning it generates more energy than it uses, then the excess could be sent back into the grid. That will be tough to do for this type of store but other stores with similar technology not requiring refrigerators and freezers would certainly create that benefit. By designing as many buildings to do that as possible would be a step to move Japan off nuclear
HollisBrown
Here's a more environmentally friendly answer - don't build a new Lawson's!
warispeace
The initial costs only seem high because previously all the environmental costs have been externalized for others, including future generations, to pay.
All of these cost should be placed on store operators from the beginning, who will pass them on to patrons, not the general public.
If this is done for all businesses (granted monetizing present and future environmental and social costs is not an exact science but can be done) then we would see many new innovative ways to cut costs. Industries, such as nuclear power, would never have been operationalized as the costs of an accident would from the beginning have made it too expensive an energy source.
WilliB
Control Freak:
Not much, actually. Sunlight is a weak and distributed energy source, and even more so in Hokkaido! If you look at the math, you will probably find that solar panels in Hokkaid during their service life produce less total energy than it took to manufacture them. So, as a feelgood gesture they are nice; as a solution an energy problem they are useless.
The idea of collecting snow sounds nice. Actually, that goes back to very old and proven methods; before cheap electricity came along, people used ice houses for cooling of produce during summer. Check it out.
ControlFreak
I never said sunlight was a powerful and concentrated energy source Willi. I just pointed out they could get a lot more of it if they put the collectors over the parking lots as well, and looking at the pic, over the ice house as well.
It would further keep their customers out of the snow and rain.
Frungy
There's a much better and cheaper method than the one they're using. It is commonly used in Europe.
Just drill some pipes down to the groundwater and put in a pump to circulate the water through pipes in the store. Groundwater retains a stable temperature year-round (although how far down you have to drill varies from 10m to 20m depending on location), so the water in the pipes will average 15 to 20 degrees celcius, meaning that your store remains a comfortable (not toasty warm, but not freezing cold) temperature.
No need for expensive and bulky solar panels and buildings to store snow. The pump takes very little power to start, and once it is started the pressure differential keeps it going, especially if the water is circulated back out of the system once it has gone around the store. The method produces zero pollution, is environmentally friendly, and in Japan makes a lot of sense since the volcanic nature of the island compensates for the higher level of groundwater, meaning that you'd probably have to drill down a lot less to get the desired effect.
The problem with relying on solar panels is simple... what do you do at night? Batteries are expensive and not environmentally friendly. This means tapping into the local power grid at night, which kindof defeats the point.
Oh, and the idea of using solar power to heat water? Not new. I've seen this trick in Africa, but very low-tech, just some reflective metal sheets focusing heat and sunlight on water storage tanks to heat water for showers in areas without power. Surprisingly effective!... but with limited temperature control. As for using snow to cool things down, that trick was around as far back as Ancient Babylon.
MarkX
The biggest problem they will face in Akita is the lack of sunlight. if I'm not mistaken, Akita gets the least amount of sunlight per year in Japan. They will have no problem with the snow though. Frungy, while I agree with your idea of using ground water, there is no way in hell the onsen/cento folks would ever let this happen. They would be too afraid it might damage their water supplies, even if it is for the better good.
Star-viking
We used the snow for refrigerating food in Tohoku when the eletricity was off because of the disaster, so a good idea, but not a new idea.