McDonald’s to Tout Green Initiatives On In-Store Touchscreens

June 3, 2009

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A new McDonald’s scheduled to open next month in North Carolina will include a touch screen display that will tout the environmental benefits of the building.

The LCD touchscreen, an Energy Efficiency Education Dashboard designed by Quality Automation Graphics, will let users browse through a Web-site-like program to learn more about the building’s energy efficiencies and McDonald’s other green initiatives. It will show images of the McDonald’s outside surrounding areas, plus a 360 degree digital tour of the inside of the building, where users can select different features to learn about the designs used, like the parking spaces with electrical plug-in outlets, water efficient equipment, and recycling areas.

Even though McDonald’s has made it a practice to not try an fit all of its 31,000-plus restaurants in in 118 countries into the same green box, if the new building is anything like the McDonald’s pilot “green” restaurant opened recently in Chicago, there could be a lot to learn. That restaurant is estimated to use 25 percent less energy than a traditional McDonald’s restaurant.

It will also provide users with local transportation information, including pedestrian paths and bicycle paths, and a “green” quiz that users can take to test their knowledge of the restaurant.

The new building is part of the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED for Retail Pilot program. Details from this building project and over 80 other pilot project teams will be used to create two new LEED for Retail rating systems to be launched later this year.

Last year, Yahoo launched an interactive energy monitoring display that monitors live energy use at the company’s Sunnyvale headquarters. It’s located in Yahoo’s cafeteria for employees to see and touch.

A recent McDonald’s publication highlights its green initiatives around the world.

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