The Cold Chain Federation has announced that the businesses participating in the Government’s Climate Change Agreement (CCA) for cold stores succeeded in meeting the agreement’s challenging target for energy efficiency improvements by the end of 2022. The cold storage CCA target for the end of 2022 required the participating facilities to improve energy efficiency by 6.67% against a 2018 benchmark. Collectively, the facilities achieved an improvement of 6.735%. The CCA scheme operates across multiple industries, offering tax benefits to businesses which sign up to energy efficiency targets. The Cold Chain Federation manages the cold storage CCA which saves the cold storage industry more than £10m each year.
This article was first published in the November 15th 2023 issue of Warehouse & Logistics News, subscribe to the magazine by clicking here.
With numerous factors and challenges for cold storage operators to overcome, L.A.C. is ideally placed to integrate bespoke solutions as the sole UK integrator for Exotec. Designed to assist operators in preparing ambient and temperature-sensitive orders, the Exotec solution fully automates the picking and transportation of order items between the storage racking structure and pick stations, using Skypod® mobile robots. The Skypod robots are fully autonomous and operate in an enclosed and human-free environment, eliminating the risk of contact or collision with either pedestrians, inventory or warehouse infrastructure, and drastically improving site productivity.
A leading grocery retailer called on BID Group to replace damaged doors at one of its chilled distribution storage facilities. The project was to replace six doors with new K2 High Speed Freezer doors eradicating the problem of ice building up on surrounding floors and walls and provide valuable energy savings by maintaining the cold store temperature. By adopting these energy-saving solutions, facilities can enhance productivity while reducing energy consumption and associated costs.
Movu ifollow, from Movu Robotics, is the versatile Autonomous Mobile Robot (AMR) solution for collaborative picking or transport of pallets or other load carriers. Their slimline design means the AMRs fit where other mobile robots will not and, unlike any other AMR, they can operate in cold stores, moving between temperatures from -25°C to +40°C and comprehensive customisation is possible with a range of modules that can interface with a variety of existing infrastructure. The simplicity of ifollow allows for rapid deployment and customers can independently create and modify mapping according to requirements. Supporting Duo-picking and Zone-picking the collaborative robot offers a turnkey solution for material flow.
Fast-growing NewCold officially opened one of the largest and most advanced cold store facilities in the world in Lebanon, IN – underlining the importance of the state as a food logistics hub. Capable of running 24/7, NewCold aims to make its warehouses increasingly grid-independent, using their own power generated from a variety of sources, including renewables. NewCold’s warehouses are about 50% more energy efficient than traditional warehouses.
It’s great to see the innovation in the cold chain sector, and to see energy efficiency targets being met.
George Simpson
Features Editor
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