Woolworths opens its most sustainable supermarket in new Burwood Brickworks

Friday 6 December, 2019: Residents of Burwood in east Melbourne are the first in Australia to experience Woolworths’ most sustainable supermarket with the official opening of the Woolworths Burwood Brickworks store.

Anchored in the ground breaking new Burwood Brickworks Shopping Centre, Woolworths Brickworks is undertaking the Living Building Challenge™ (LBC), which is the world’s most rigorous proven performance standard for buildings.

The new store will operate using 100% renewable energy which is equivalent to taking 700 cars off the road each year. 

Woolworths Supermarkets Managing Director Claire Peters said: “Woolworths Burwood Brickworks is the next step in our journey to create a neighbourhood food store, with sustainability and the needs of local customers at the heart of its design. 

“As Australia’s largest retailer, we recognise our responsibility to minimise our environmental footprint and are committed to playing our part in creating a greener, more sustainable future.

“Woolworths Burwood Brickworks will incorporate a range of sustainability initiatives that aim to reduce the environmental impact of the store’s operations and help customers live more sustainably too.”

These features include LED lights to reduce power usage and the application of fridge doors on all meat and dairy cases to prevent cold air spilling from the cases. 

Natural refrigerant technology is being used for the store’s chillers, freezers and hot tap water production, delivering what amounts to zero direct emissions. All the timber cladding used is also sustainably-sourced. 

Customers will be able to purchase reusable produce bags made from lightweight nylon to carry their fresh produce, and paper bags made from 80 percent recycled paper to carry their shopping home. 

Claire Peters concluded: “From store lighting and air-conditioning to food refrigeration and preparation, we have looked at all angles to see how we can build and run this store more sustainably. 

“Woolworths Burwood Brickworks is the culmination of all our efforts to-date in one store. We will continue to trial initiatives that help us reduce our environmental impact and look forward to the feedback from our teams and customers as we do.”

The new store will employ more than 170 team members and be open from 7am to 12pm, Monday to Sunday. Woolworths Burwood Brickworks is located in Burwood Brickworks shopping centre, 70 Middleborough Rd, Burwood East VIC 315.

Woolworths Burwood Brickworks sustainability initiatives

• Reusable Produce Bags: same tare weight as current produce plastic bag, made from lightweight Nylon, can hold 2.5kg of produce, reusable and washable, RRP $5 for 3 bags.
• Berries, Sweet Solanto tomatoes, Mini Qukes and Vine sweet mini capsicums available in loose format to remove or reduce plastic packaging in-store
• Reducing bakery waste by  diverting surplus in-store baked bread to be used as livestock feed
• Odd Bunch: increased space and prominence of Odd Bunch range within Fruit and Veg area.
• OzHarvest: rescuing surplus food from the store and delivering it to local hunger relief charities
• Recycled material shopping trolleys, carry baskets and roller baskets: plastic content  shopping trolley made from 100 percent locally sourced recycled milk bottles, as well as hand and roller baskets (excluding handle) 
• Battery recycling station at front of store for customers to return their batteries
• Paper bags made from 80 percent recycled paper to carry shopping and fully recyclable. RRP: $0.20.
• Availability of cardboard boxes at the front of store for customers as an alternative to bags to carry their shopping
• Customer resting bench made from a minimum of 97% recycled commercial packaging plastics
• Soft plastics recycling bin: in-store collection bin for customers to return soft plastics and packaging
• Bokashi One composting unit: for every unit of this eco friendly home composting system sold in-store, 30 meals will be delivered through OzHarvest to people in need.

Store build/construction:

• Refrigeration doors: doors have been included on all meat and dairy cases, which will reduce the energy consumption by around 30 percent  by preventing cold air spilling from the cases
• Refrigeration systems: by using natural refrigerants, Woolworths’ fridges contribute no direct CO2 emissions using 100% natural (CO2) rather than synthetic refrigerants
• Reducing energy by using waste heat from refrigeration to heat the store and switching lights off after hours to reduce power usage
• Use of recycled materials such as timber buffer rails substituted with product made from 100 percent  recycled plastic recycled by customers through REDcycle 
• Recycled timber on walls using recycled or reclaimed timber on walls and registers and other locations with timber finishes which are permanently attached to the structure
• All internal pipework and wiring is PVC free. Piping has been replaced with HDPE or aluminium. PVC wire casing has been replaced with silicon casing.
• LED lighting is 35% more efficient than traditional lighting. We also have natural light in areas of the store which are occupied by team-members for more than 4 hours a day. This saves energy and improves wellbeing. 

About Burwood Brickworks 

Burwood Brickworks is a mixed-use development incorporating a range of sustainability measures including a large solar PV system and an embedded electricity network, achieving a 6 Star Green Star Design & As Built v1.1 (Design Rating) by the Green Building Council of Australia. The retail centre at Burwood Brickworks is on its way to be the world’s most sustainable shopping centre with 13,000 sqm of retail, including anchor tenants Woolworths, Dan Murphy’s and Reading Cinemas. Located 19 kilometres from Melbourne’s CBD, Burwood Brickworks will be the home of Australia’s first rooftop farm in a shopping centre environment, acre Farm & Eatery.

For more information on Burwood Brickworks, please visit https://www.frasersproperty.com.au/vic/burwood-brickworks