Acrel EIOT Lawson Store Smart Power Distribution IoT Solution

Ⅰ、Lawson Convenience Store Energy Retrofit Project

　　Founded in the United States in 1939, Lawson opened its first store in Japan in 1975 after securing a franchise license from its U.S. parent company. Today, Lawson has evolved into a major conglomerate centered on its convenience store operations, with a business portfolio spanning both the retail and entertainment sectors. As of the end of December 2022, the company operated a total of 20,693 convenience stores distributed across Japan, Indonesia, the United States, Thailand, the Philippines, and China. Currently, there are 6,500 Lawson stores in mainland China, with the total number projected to exceed 10,000 by 2025.

Lawson convenience stores are characterized by their sheer numbers and widespread geographic distribution. Although individual stores are relatively small in physical size, they consume significant amounts of energy; consequently, the aggregate energy consumption across an entire region is substantial. As a result, the operating companies for each region are designated as key entities subject to priority oversight by local green energy and conservation authorities.

Energy Management Platform: Supports Lawson convenience stores by facilitating various services, including energy data collection, energy monitoring and control, and the assessment of energy-saving performance.

Energy Consumption Monitoring Module: Phase 1 involves identifying high-consumption stores, screening for stores with anomalous energy usage patterns, analyzing the root causes of high consumption, and calculating the potential return on investment for specific energy-saving initiatives within each store.

Intelligent Lighting Module: Implements energy-saving technical upgrades specifically for store signage. This module enables automated, platform-based control of lighting schedules—adjusted according to seasonal variations and time of day—and allows the platform to remotely deploy optimized lighting strategies based on real-time energy-saving performance data.

Ⅱ、Project Outcomes and Benefits:

1. Online Store Management: Transitions from the previous method of manual data recording and uploading to direct online data acquisition. This allows for the real-time generation of energy consumption reports for each store, thereby reducing the workload for store inspectors and significantly enhancing the accuracy and integrity of energy data.
2. Energy Consumption Management: Leverages the online monitoring platform to track the real-time energy usage of every store. This enables store staff to conveniently adjust the energy consumption of high-load equipment, thereby elevating the overall standard of energy management within the stores.
3. KPI Benchmarking: Establishes key performance indicators (KPIs) based on metrics such as "energy consumption per unit area" and "regional average energy consumption." By correlating a store's energy usage with its customer traffic volume, the system aims to ensure that energy consumption levels remain commensurate with sales revenue performance. 04. Basis for Energy-Saving Retrofitting: By comparing the energy consumption levels of the premises, an energy-saving assessment is conducted for key energy-consuming equipment—such as air conditioning, signage, lighting, and heaters—to identify the areas offering the highest returns. Subsequently, technical retrofits are implemented in these specific areas, and the actual payback period is calculated using a dedicated platform.