Lidl interior

Lidl is spending £27m on greener refrigeration

Lidl is ploughing £27m into new refrigeration in a bid to improve the green credentials of its in-store chillers.

The new ‘plug-in chillers’ have a leakage rate of less than 1%, making them “more environmentally friendly than standard CO2 refrigeration systems”, and will be rolled out to 150 UK stores this year.

“This new technology is our best ever and has the low electricity consumption of a synthetic system while clearly beating any alternatives based on natural refrigerants,” said Lidl central services director Bernhard Klein.

Meanwhile, discount rival Aldi has revealed it is carrying out a programme to identify the best way to reduce energy consumption across its UK portfolio. It has hired Energy & Technical Services to identify improvements in areas including lighting and refrigeration.

Both moves signified the commitment of the discounters towards CSR, said James Russell, commercial director at discount wholesaler Rowan. “They prove the discount sector is beginning to move in a much greener direction,” he added.