I’ve seen that same spreadsheet in a dozen companies now, and it’s why I keep saying total kWh is a vanity metric. It tells you how much building you own. It tells you almost nothing about how well you run it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Energy use intensity<\/strong> is the fix, and in GCC retail and F&B it takes a bit more care than most guides admit. So let’s get into what it is, what good looks like, and where it stops working.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Energy use intensity, usually shortened to EUI and defined by ENERGY STAR<\/a> as energy use per unit of floor area, is energy consumed divided by something that describes the size or output of the site. For buildings that’s normally kWh per square meter, measured over a month or a year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That one division changes what you’re measuring. Total kWh answers “how big is this?”<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Energy use intensity answers “how hard is this site working for every square meter it occupies?”<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Which is the question you actually wanted answered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here’s what it does to a ranking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Your flagship store will almost always<\/strong> top a list sorted by total consumption, because it’s four times the floor area of everything else. Divide by square meters and it often drops to the middle of the pack, while a small unit nobody had looked at climbs to the top.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That reshuffling is the entire value of an energy intensity benchmark. The engineering visit that was going to your flagship now goes somewhere it will find something.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because it’s the number the invoice gives you, and it takes no effort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Every utility bill in the world reports total consumption.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Nobody’s bill tells you your intensity, because the utility doesn’t know your floor area. Published references exist, and Energy Star maintains national median tables by property type<\/a>, but somebody has to go and look them up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So the metric that takes no work is the one that ends up shown to the board, which then it sets the agenda for a year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The second reason is that it feels fair.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ranking by total kWh looks objective, and it’s easy to defend in a meeting. Ranking by intensity requires you to have decided on a denominator, and that decision is arguable, which makes people nervous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My view after enough of these projects:<\/strong> an arguable number that points at the right site beats an unarguable number that points at the wrong one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It depends almost entirely on format, and the spread is wider than people expect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let me start with a warning here:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The figures I’m about to give you come from estates I’ve worked in, most of them outside the Gulf. Don’t lift them as GCC targets. Climate, building stock, trading hours and refrigeration standards all move the level, and a 45\u00b0C summer moves it up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What travels between markets is the shape.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In my data a supermarket typically runs somewhere between 40 and 60 kWh\/m\u00b2 a month, because refrigeration never stops. Fashion retail in a mild month can sit at 12 to 18. That’s a three or four times gap between two things both called “a shop,” and a gap that size turns up in every market I’ve looked at.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The absolute numbers move but the ratio between formats often holds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
What is energy use intensity, and why does it beat total kWh?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"retail](\"https:\/\/apollo.eco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/blog-sep14-G1-flip-1024x576.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nWhy is total kWh such a persistent trap?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
What’s a realistic energy use intensity benchmark for retail?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"energy](\"https:\/\/apollo.eco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/blog-sep14-G2-street-mall-1024x576.png\")
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