Trigeneration from biomass for an Eroski supermarket in Vitoria

Eroski has presented at the Vitoria-Gasteiz City Council its supermarket project that is moving towards energy self-sufficiency and that it is developing in collaboration with the National Center for Renewable Energy (CENER) as the technological center in charge of technical coordination. This is a pioneering project in Europe that will have an innovative trigeneration system capable of supplying electricity, heat and cold from locally sourced biomass, drastically reducing consumption from the electrical grid.

The general secretary of EROSKI, Mikel Larrea, together with the technical director of the project at CENER, Sergio Diaz de Garayo, have conveyed to the mayor of Vitoria-Gasteiz, Gorka Urtaran, the work schedule for the execution of the pilot project in the EROSKI store/ center Ali Gobeo that the cooperative has in the capital of Álava that starts this month and will conclude in mid-2016.

 “Moving towards sustainable construction is one of the fundamental objectives of Eroski's strategic Environmental plan, in order to reduce the environmental impact of our activity. In 2012 we developed the first 100% Sustainable Zero Emissions store and now we are addressing a new generation of sustainable store whose main objective is to demonstrate the viability of a comprehensive and innovative solution for the modernization of supermarkets in order to achieve a drastic reduction in dependency. connection to the electrical grid with a relevant improvement in reducing the environmental impact,” stated the general secretary of Eroski I, Mikel Larrea.

The definition of the project began in 2013, and it is now when the execution of the work begins at the Eroski Ali Gobeo supermarket in the capital of Alava. In addition to implementing the energy saving measures that were already developed in the previous Eroski eco-store model in Oñati (Gipuzkoa) and that are currently being extended along with the transformation of stores to the new “with you” commercial model, it will be install an innovative system capable of supplying the cold, heat and electricity needs that a supermarket requires from a biomass boiler to make it the most advanced supermarket in Europe in terms of energy self-sufficiency.

“This project represents a direct saving of 494 MWh of electricity per year, that is, a reduction of 178 tons of CO2 emissions per year. The transformative potential of the project will not only be in the construction of new supermarkets but, above all, in the energy eco-reform of existing ones. It pursues savings in electricity consumption of more than 25% with energy efficiency measures, which is then completed with a 100% renewable energy trigeneration unit based on biomass as a primary source," detailed the technical director of the CENER project, Sergio Diaz de Garayo.

In a traditional supermarket, approximately 55% of the energy is allocated to the production of cold using electric compressors. This project develops an innovative trigeneration system combining three very different technologies that work together: biomass, absorption and cogeneration, capable of supplying a large part of the cold required by the refrigerated storage chambers, the freezing islands and the refrigerated room walls. of sales, in addition to an ORC cycle (Organic Rankine Cycle) that will generate electrical energy from the heat of an integrated biomass boiler, using the waste heat for heating. All this equipment will be installed in such a way as to guarantee the flexibility of the system and its subsequent extension to future installations in other supermarkets. Applied in shops and supermarkets in Europe, it is estimated that the project would allow a reduction of up to 2.4% of the continent's electricity consumption.