Kroger’s New LED Lighting Shines a Bright Light on SAIC Energy-Efficiency Program

Viens, who is the "energy-efficiency incentive guru" for the Kroger Company, which is headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, had been looking to do a pilot project with high-efficiency light-emitting diode (LED) lights. She knew that LEDs could save Kroger's Central Division a significant amount of money on electric bills. Kroger is one of the largest grocery chains in the country.

Now, what started as a one-store pilot has become a first-of-its-kind, statewide energy-efficiency upgrade that replaces all of the fluorescent lighting in eligible frozen food reach-in coolers and refrigerated dairy and drink cases in Kroger stores with high-efficiency LED lighting — and Viens credits SAIC with making it possible.

"I like having an organization like SAIC out there," Viens said, "because it makes my life easier as I'm trying to do rollouts across our chain of stores. Your organization has done itself proud in Illinois."

From Oregon to Illinois

SAIC is the implementation contractor for the business side of Ameren Illinois Utilities' Act On Energy energy-efficiency program, which provides incentives to business and industry customers to increase their energy efficiency. For Viens, knowing who the implementation contractor is "tells me if it's going to be easy or hard."

Viens, whose official title is corporate incentive manager, said that Kroger "had a great deal of success dealing with SAIC" in Oregon. There, SAIC had helped increase energy efficiency in the Fred Meyer Stores grocery chain, one of almost a dozen owned by the Kroger Company. Viens met SAIC's Anne Wagner, an outreach program manager, on a visit there, and Wagner put her in touch with SAIC's David Gibson, the Illinois deputy program manager. "David has just been incredible to deal with," she said.

She wanted to know if there was "a way that we can leverage our lessons learned from our combined experience in Oregon in Illinois." When she met with Gibson, "We had a favorable interaction," she said. "He explained how the project worked, and just how your organization works, and how the whole thing works in Illinois."

Act On Energy

Ameren Illinois Utilities' energy-efficiency program, like many others around the country, operates on the principle that it's vastly cheaper — and greener — to promote energy efficiency than it is to build new generation capacity. And even if a utility would rather sell more electricity, public utility commissions prefer the greener route.

The cost of electricity from "a new, coal-fired power plant would be above $3,000 per kilowatt," said John Nicol, a senior engineer and industrial program manager at SAIC. By contrast, a kilowatt freed up by energy efficiency — and its attendant demand reduction — costs about $500.

Act On Energy's incentives pay a percentage of the cost and can be the tipping point for getting energy efficiency projects to move forward. In the first year of the program, Ameren Illinois Utilities' business customers received more than $3 million in incentives that will save approximately 5.3 million kWh. That's enough energy to power more than 4,867 homes for an entire year, and will save businesses $4 million annually in energy cost. The money for incentives comes from a small surcharge on the monthly bills of electricity customers.

In the role of implementation contractor, SAIC effectively reaches out to utility customers and makes them aware of the available incentives. When customers access the program, SAIC guides them through the kinds of incentives that are available to them and how to take advantage of them. That may include site visits, needs assessments, assistance with paperwork and navigating red tape.

From Toe-Dipping to Plunge

The combination of an SAIC visit to Kroger's corporate office to explain the program and the incentive dollars available through the Act On Energy Program convinced Kroger "to put our toe in the water with Act On Energy." Viens stated "We would not have done the pilot project in Illinois were it not for the incentives from Ameren Illinois — the money talks — but your team that I've worked with on the Illinois project has been exceptional."

"Initially," said Lance Escue, SAIC energy program manager in Peoria, "they had just wanted to do one store as a pilot in Ameren Illinois Utilities' service territory." In that pilot store, when the LEDs had replaced the fluorescents, Escue said, "Customers were going up to the store manager and saying, 'Wow, what did you guys do to the refrigerated case area? Everything just looks so much brighter.' The lighting is just so much more brilliant." Escue said that with the combination of energy savings and customer approval, "I think you know that you're onto a good thing."

"From the pilot," Viens said, "we went to the 22-store phase one rollout, which had not been funded [yet by Kroger], but because of the success of the pilot and the incentives available through Act On Energy, we were able to go get funding from the corporation."

According to Gibson, "The expected savings for the 23 stores where Kroger did the LED retrofits was approximately 1.9 million kWh," With early numbers in, he said, "the actual savings achieved were just over two million kWh." In addition, Kroger implemented an energy-efficient motor upgrade in their refrigeration units in 10 stores for an additional savings of approximately 150,000 kWh annually.

Get the LED In

LED lighting — produced by low-power light emitting diodes — is not only very energy efficient in terms of light, it also produces significantly less heat than conventional fluorescents. For this project, a 20-watt LED "stick" replaces one and, in some cases, two 58-watt fluorescents to produce what Viens described as a better, more consistent quality of light. In addition, LEDs produce significantly less heat than conventional fluorescent tubes.

That benefits in two ways. First, with LEDs, the refrigeration system doesn't have to compensate for the heat generated by the lights, so refrigeration costs are lower. Indeed, Viens said, Kroger is seeing a reduction in refrigeration cost.

Second, fluorescent tubes, by regulation, have to be sleeved because they're made of glass and in proximity to food. "And the thing with fluorescents is that they dim over time because they do not thrive in colder environments," Viens said. And the sleeve yellows over time because of the heat, which "degrades the quality of the light." Not so LEDs, which are already enclosed.

Another benefit of LEDs is that they come on instantly and at full brightness, and can be turned on and off with motion sensors. "When no one is in the aisle, it makes good sense to turn off the lights. You do it at home, and we do it at Kroger," Viens said.

The combination of motion sensors and LEDs, Viens said, enables the grocery chain to keep the lights off about 30 percent of the time, something that was impossible with fluorescents.

Program Plays in Peoria — and Beyond

Viens, who said that Kroger tends to be very conservative in talking about its green initiatives, decided it wanted to get some attention for the pilot in the press. She said the SAIC team hadn't really thought about it but were willing to listen.

She talked with SAIC's team, and "it was in talking about the 'what abouts' that SAIC's team made me feel that things could happen. I've been in this business a long time, and that never happens. A lot of places, you have to drag them [other vendors] kicking and screaming."

Ameren Illinois Utilities was getting ready to do its April bill insert for Earth Day, "and it was perfect," Viens said. "So we had a press event in the Peoria store as was highlighted in the April bill insert."

"It honestly is amazing from a marketing perspective," said Geoff Brigham, SAIC marketing and outreach consultant. "We did one event and it continued to get notoriety and kind of take on a life of its own. It has truly become viral. It was picked up through the television stations around here, the newspapers, and Ameren — even one of their sister companies in Missouri — really picked up some good press for their energy-efficiency programs for this."

"It was all working through SAIC's people" that made it happen, Viens said. "I just can't say enough about the interactions I've had with your Illinois team."

Related Information

• Ameren Illinois Utilities Announce Successful Electric Energy-Efficiency Pilot Program at Kroger
• YouTube: Kroger EE LED Pilot - Ameren Illinois Utilities