Piggly Wiggly opening new Columbus store Sept. 9, says it will have ‘GreenChill Platinum’ certification
A new Piggly Wiggly supermarket opening Sept. 9 in east Columbus will have an environmentally friendly operation, the store’s owner, Phenix City-based JTM Corp., said Wednesday.
The 35,763-square-foot grocery store will carry a “GreenChill Platinum” designation from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency when its doors open to the shopping public, the company said.
However, as of late Thursday, the company’s application for the certification had not been approved, said Tom Land, who oversees the EPA’s “GreenChill Partnership” program. A consultant is checking with the supermarket company to find out what type of refrigerant is in the store’s heating and air system, and other stand-alone equipment, he said.
“I don’t know if they’ve got a response. Once they get that information, they will be able to process the application,” said Land, noting the approval could come as soon as Friday.
GreenChill is a certification for stores built with product refrigeration systems that are kinder to the environment. In essence, they reduce emissions, thus cutting negative ozone impact on the global climate.
JTM said it has been working with Heatcraft and Lennox International, companies that own the Kysor/Warren refrigeration manufacturing plant in Columbus. The equipment installed by Kysor/Warren will use a newer ammonia CO2 refrigerant instead of freon, JTM said.
“What’s in the main part of the system, in the big system, is very very advanced and innovative, and we’re excited about it,” Land said. “We have to cross our i’s and dot our t’s and make sure they didn’t make a silly choice to put something that’s bad for the ozone layer in the rest of the store.”
JTM Corp. financial controller Keith Milligan could not be reached for comment.
“We’ve been trying to get that location (for) about 20 years,” Milligan said last summer of the shopping center’s site as construction was starting on the commercial project.
The Piggly Wiggly supermarket will be the anchor of a small strip shopping center at 2424 Woodruff Farm Road, near the intersection of Forrest Road. About 19,000 square feet of additional retail space is on the 9-acre site, which JTM bought more than three years ago from a church that had planned to build there, but decided otherwise.
The EPA said there are now only nine stores in the U.S. with the GreenChill Platinum designation, with only one in Georgia, at a Sprouts market in Dunwoody. Aside from the top platinum category, there also are gold and silver levels.
The EPA says the GreenChill certification is good for only a year, with stores needing to reapply annually to maintain the designation.
JTM said its “partnership” with Kysor/Warren “will allow potential future (commercial) customers of theirs to see this state of the art system in a real world, working environment.”
JTM Corp., founded in 1966 by Tommy Milligan, operates 19 Piggly Wiggly supermarkets in the area. That includes eight in Columbus and four in Phenix City, making it the largest grocery company in the local market in total locations. Publix, Winn-Dixie and Walmart Supercenters are its primary competitors.
Piggly Wiggly is a privately owned supermarket chain founded in Memphis, Tenn., in 1916, although its headquarters is now in Keene, N.H. JTM is among its independent owners across 17 states.
This story was originally published August 26, 2015 at 6:05 PM with the headline "Piggly Wiggly opening new Columbus store Sept. 9, says it will have ‘GreenChill Platinum’ certification ."