Shoppers in Somerset and Bristol have found supermarket aisles lined with empty, switched-off fridges as Britain braces for another hot week — a symptom, experts say, of appliances designed for a climate that no longer exists.
“These fridges were designed decades ago in a much cooler world,” said Dr Alan Foster, a Bristol-based refrigeration expert who runs tests at Refrigeration Developments and Testing (RD&T) in Lower Langford, Somerset. In his climate-controlled lab, Foster fits standard fridges with sensors and fills them with gel blocks to measure how evenly they cool. “We can test the temperature across different parts of the fridge,” he explained. By making the room warmer or cooler, his team sees how the appliance survives in a warming world.
“Fridges designed for up to 32C are failing as UK temperatures soar, with empty supermarket cabinets and record call-outs.”
The problem is simple: most fridges in UK homes and supermarkets are designed to operate in air temperatures up to about 32C. Last week, and potentially next week, temperatures have soared past that — in Somerset, they hit 36C. “In most of the supermarkets out there, the fridges were designed for 32C, which obviously isn't enough, because these were designed decades ago,” Foster said. Once temperatures exceed the system's limit, the compressor runs continuously to keep things cold, eventually leading to failure.
Engineers in Wiltshire have reported record call-outs for home fridges that have “given up the ghost”. Supermarkets, meanwhile, are forced to reduce the number of chilled cabinets in use to keep others running off central refrigeration units. “When systems are under pressure,” Foster noted, supermarkets may close some cabinets to protect the most crucial ones.
The consequences are already visible. A study commissioned by the UK Climate Change Commission found that the food industry was badly hit by the 2022 heatwave, which saw a maximum temperature of 40.3C for the first time. The study noted increased energy costs and failure of refrigeration systems in numerous retail facilities.
As the Met Office warns that heatwaves are becoming more common in the UK, the question — posed by Foster's work for major retailers — is whether the nation's fridges can keep up.
In his lab, the answer is becoming clear. “Once temperatures go beyond what the system was designed for,” Foster said, “the compressor works continually to keep things cold – eventually leading to breakdown.”