Henry's Web Log

For almost two years, we've been developing, testing and improving a fantastic innovation for the supermarket refrigeration controls industry. ACI, working under Zero3 Controls, has developed what I refer to as the BabelFish for refrigeration control. Not only does it translate nearly all commercial controllers to a universal XML format, but also puts refrigeration energy and usage data on the web. The protocol is clean, efficient and very much revolutionizes the industry at a time when energy management is big on everyone's radar.

We had some units in an Ohio store and Pennsylvania store, but not since April. Prompted by my immenant deployment, and motivated by our advisory board, we arranged a meeting with Greg Wade, the manager of a popular, independent group of 3 supermarkets in our own New River Valley. We learned that all 3 of his stores had electronic controls. 2 will make excellent demonstration candidates immediately, and the third will be refit soon.

Zero3 will perform an "eCommissioning" where Mr. Wade's stores are tuned for optimum energy performance, without sacrificing food quality. Supermarket electricity bills are the single largest expense on any store's balance sheet, after payroll. Even a 15% decrease in energy can save $2000 per MONTH in a store's expenses, plus the reduction in carbon emissions and improvement of our energy grid. One popular quote I've heard, but not been able to verify, is that supermarkets consume 10% of all generated power in the United States. So reducing every store's energy usage makes a huge improvement in our nation's energy posture.

We look forward to serving the Wade's Foods chain well, and to the subsequent stores that have been waiting for a real demonstration of this technology.