A com­bi­na­tion of extreme weath­er and the upcom­ing COP26 con­fer­ence is mak­ing net-zero head­line news. Car­bon foot­prints are under scruti­ny and the prob­lem is emis­sions. For sup­ply chains, that means logis­tics.

Con­tribut­ing more to the prob­lem than any oth­er sec­tor, trans­port pro­duced 27% of total UK green­house gas (GHG) emis­sions in 2019, accord­ing to data from the UK Depart­ment for Busi­ness, Ener­gy and Indus­tri­al Strat­e­gy. Of this, HGVs (18%) and vans (17%) togeth­er were respon­si­ble for more than a third (35%). Fac­tor in kerosene-rich air freight, plus emis­sions in the wake of car­go ship­ping, and logis­tics is firm­ly in the frame for cli­mate crimes.

As a result, the UK reg­u­la­to­ry net is tight­en­ing. With a ban on sales of new diesel lor­ries due by 2040, the sus­tain­abil­i­ty squeeze is on and logis­tics must decar­bonise, fast.

Going green on electric avenue

In road trans­port, the green agen­da is hav­ing a pos­i­tive impact at region­al and local lev­el. M&H Car­ri­ers, for exam­ple, just invest­ed £500,000 in 10 new e‑vans to elec­tri­fy its High­land deliv­ery fleet – a first for the north of Scot­land. Such sto­ries of rolling elec­tri­fi­ca­tion are appear­ing almost dai­ly.

Of course, the elec­tric avenue is not the only route to car­bon reduc­tion. Her­mes UK has ordered anoth­er 70 deliv­ery trucks fuelled by com­pressed nat­ur­al gas (CNG), tak­ing the firm’s total CNG fleet up to 160 and mak­ing it the largest in the parcels sec­tor. Each new Ive­co S‑way mod­el can cut CO2 emis­sions by more than 80% com­pared to a diesel vehi­cle that com­plies to the cur­rent Euro 6 emis­sions stan­dards, which were set in 2015.

Rather than embark­ing on a rad­i­cal modal shift, say from road to rail, a sim­ple fuel change often makes short-term green­ing afford­able, says Andrew Will­son, CEO of fuel sup­pli­er Cory­ton. “Switch­ing to sus­tain­able fuels is a drop-in solu­tion, requir­ing no sig­nif­i­cant invest­ment in infra­struc­ture or vehi­cle archi­tec­ture and capa­ble of deliv­er­ing near net-zero oper­at­ing CO2 emis­sions.”

Will­son adds a caveat that life­cy­cle analy­sis always beats a tailpipe focus. His note of cau­tion is time­ly, giv­en new research from Cor­nell and Stan­ford Uni­ver­si­ty that reveals blue hydro­gen to be more car­bon-inten­sive than using diesel, nat­ur­al gas or even coal direct­ly for heat.

Hydrogen economy set to make waves

Heat aside, though, hydro­gen is still a hot prospect. Accord­ing to the 2021 BloombergNEF New Ener­gy Out­look report, ship­ments of elec­trol­y­sers to split water for clean hydro­gen are set to dou­ble in 2021 and quadru­ple in 2022, with Chi­na the dom­i­nant play­er.

The UK government’s 10-point plan for a green indus­tri­al rev­o­lu­tion, launched last Novem­ber, includ­ed a pre­lim­i­nary tar­get of 5GW of low car­bon hydro­gen pro­duc­tion capac­i­ty by 2030, with those ambi­tions expand­ed upon by the new hydro­gen strat­e­gy, released this August.

Main­stream adop­tion, how­ev­er, remains some way off, explains Ben­jamin K Sova­cool, pro­fes­sor of ener­gy pol­i­cy at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Sus­sex Busi­ness School and co-author of a new research paper explor­ing appli­ca­tions of hydro­gen in indus­try. Use of hydro­gen for short-haul truck­ing could be fea­si­ble with­in six to eight years, he posits, although its use as an alter­na­tive fuel in ship­ping is like­ly to take longer – poten­tial­ly up to 15 years. 

Hybrid air­craft tech­nol­o­gy offers an alter­na­tive that sits between fast, car­bon-inten­sive air freight and slow, low­er car­bon-inten­sive sur­face trans­port

Accord­ing to his find­ings, deliv­ery times might be halved if hydro­gen were pri­ori­tised by indus­try and pol­i­cy­mak­ers. And while hydro­gen for ship­ping may take longer, its impact could be greater. Hydro­gen and hydro­gen-derived fuels could meet more than 70% of final ener­gy demand.

A co-direc­tor of the new £20m Indus­tri­al Decar­bon­i­sa­tion Research and Inno­va­tion Cen­tre, fund­ed by the NGO UK Research and Inno­va­tion, Sova­cool believes ammo­nia will be key for ship­ping. “Mar­itime trans­port is like­ly to ben­e­fit from renew­able hydro­gen-derived ammo­nia as its pri­ma­ry decar­bon­is­ing fuel option in the medi­um term. Falling elec­tric­i­ty prices from renew­able and nuclear ener­gy will low­er pro­duc­tion costs of green ammo­nia, bring­ing it in line with fos­sil-derived hydro­car­bon fuels.”

Ship emissions in the dock

Ship­ping was respon­si­ble for more than 1 bil­lion tonnes of CO2 emis­sions in 2018, rep­re­sent­ing 2.9% of total glob­al human emis­sions, accord­ing to the 2020 GHG study from the Inter­na­tion­al Mar­itime Organ­i­sa­tion (IMO), with inter­na­tion­al ship­ping respon­si­ble for 740 mil­lion tonnes.

In response, the ini­tial GHG strat­e­gy from the IMO envis­ages a reduc­tion in car­bon inten­si­ty of inter­na­tion­al ship­ping by at least 40% com­pared to 2008 by 2030, striv­ing towards 70% by 2050.

Many envi­ron­men­tal impacts of inter­na­tion­al ship­ping actu­al­ly occur when ves­sels are moored up, rather than out at sea. So, the Port of Ham­burg has intro­duced green berthing areas in the Elbe Riv­er, with solar-pow­ered moor­ing sys­tems built by Straat­man.

When it comes to rethink­ing ship design, the ‘True Zero Emis­sion con­cept from British com­pa­ny Wind­ship Tech­nol­o­gy promis­es more dis­rup­tive inno­va­tion. Dubbed ‘the Tes­la of the seas’, its triple-wing rigs har­ness the pow­er of the wind, with the look of a 21st-cen­tu­ry clean-tech clip­per.

Collaborate to cut carbon and save money

Beyond the trans­port itself, logis­tics is also over­haul­ing oper­a­tional process­es and sys­tems, par­tic­u­lar­ly in light of the envi­ron­men­tal impacts of ecom­merce growth dur­ing lock­down.

Engag­ing cus­tomers can also help shrink car­bon foot­prints, says Dr Vagge­lis Gian­nikas, asso­ciate pro­fes­sor with the School of Man­age­ment at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Bath: “Retail­ers and providers should exam­ine tech­nolo­gies that allow for green­er logis­tics, while at the same time devel­op­ing mech­a­nisms to moti­vate sus­tain­able con­sumer behav­iours.”

Accord­ing to Gian­nikas, who is also direc­tor of the Cen­tre for Smart Ware­hous­ing and Logis­tics Sys­tems at the uni­ver­si­ty, some com­pa­nies have already found inno­v­a­tive ways to decar­bonise, includ­ing incen­tives to con­sol­i­date orders into few­er deliv­er­ies, avoid­ing unnec­es­sary use of fast and ultra-fast options. As well as pack­ag­ing that lim­its emp­ty space, they are pri­ori­tis­ing a reduc­tion in returns, even offer­ing items for free. Direct com­mu­ni­ca­tion with cus­tomers – for instance, via text to arrange for an attend­ed deliv­ery – helps opti­mi­sa­tion, too.

Col­lab­o­ra­tion between actors in retail and logis­tics can also open doors, with the UK click-and-col­lect agree­ment between the Post Office and lead­ing logis­tics car­ri­er DPD a prime exam­ple.

Switch­ing to sus­tain­able fuels is a drop-in solu­tion, requir­ing no sig­nif­i­cant invest­ment in infra­struc­ture or vehi­cle archi­tec­ture and capa­ble of deliv­er­ing near net-zero oper­at­ing CO2 emis­sions

In addi­tion, areas are emerg­ing for syn­er­gis­tic inno­va­tion around decar­bon­i­sa­tion in part­ner­ship with oth­er major growth mar­kets for elec­tri­fi­ca­tion, such as build­ings and real estate.

Pow­er man­age­ment com­pa­ny Eaton has devel­oped an approach called Build­ings as a Grid that unites the pow­er needs of both prop­er­ty assets and EVs to opti­mise charg­ing, using onsite renew­ables such as solar PV, plus ener­gy stor­age.

Work­ing with French postal ser­vices group La Poste, Eaton test­ed the approach on elec­tric vans deliv­er­ing mail south-west of Paris. In year-long tri­als, 59% of elec­tric­i­ty demand for two EVs was cov­ered by solar pow­er, sav­ing, on aver­age, 1.52 tons of CO2 com­pared to a diesel vehi­cle.

Digital efficiencies enabled by AI

Like many indus­tries seek­ing per­for­mance improve­ments, logis­tics is nec­es­sar­i­ly embrac­ing digi­ti­sa­tion as well. Cou­pled with AI, it can help elim­i­nate mis­takes and offer com­plete vis­i­bil­i­ty through­out a prod­uct jour­ney. Not only can firms speed car­go from A to B, they can assess tra­di­tion­al routes and meth­ods of tran­sit to improve effi­cien­cy.

Work­ing smart in this way offers a poten­tial win-win in the short term, sug­gests Sam Tya­gi, sup­ply chain expert and CEO of cus­toms clear­ance plat­form KlearNow: “This rel­a­tive­ly sim­ple process of sharp­en­ing oper­a­tions across import and export mar­kets will have a sig­nif­i­cant impact on reduc­ing car­bon emis­sions, while solu­tions are found for more com­pli­cat­ed chal­lenges like air freight.”

Giv­en the sheer scale of the decar­bon­i­sa­tion task ahead, the real­i­ty is that the indus­try will need all these ini­tia­tives and inno­va­tions, and more, on the road to net-zero logis­tics.

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Drones, electric planes, hybrids and airships 

Air freight is the logis­tics of choice for high­er-worth goods such as per­ish­ables need­ing to be deliv­ered fast. Although it accounts for less than 1% of world trade ship­ments by vol­ume, the glob­al car­go air­line indus­try was val­ued at well in excess of $100bn in 2020.

Accord­ing to the UK government’s Jet Zero con­sul­ta­tion, how­ev­er, the sector’s cli­mate tra­jec­to­ry is a con­cern. While avi­a­tion might con­tribute only between 2% and 3% of glob­al green­house gas emis­sions today, it is fore­cast to become the sec­ond-high­est resid­ual emit­ter in 2050. Inno­va­tion is a must.

Sup­port­ing big advances in small pack­ages, a three-month drone tri­al fund­ed by a £200,000 grant from Aero­space Corn­wall will see a Fly­logix unmanned aer­i­al vehi­cle make dai­ly flights between Land’s End and the Isles of Scil­ly. These machines con­sume just 2 litres of fuel per hour, as opposed to between 20 and 200 litres for tra­di­tion­al air­craft mak­ing a com­pa­ra­ble jour­ney. The drone will car­ry time-crit­i­cal items such as med­i­cines and blood sam­ples.

At the oth­er end of the scale, DHL Express has claimed a world first for sus­tain­able avi­a­tion with its order of 12 ful­ly elec­tric Alice eCar­go planes from man­u­fac­tur­er Evi­a­tion. Able to car­ry 1,200kg, the sin­gle-pilot air­craft are due for deliv­ery in 2024.

And on a big­ger scale still are air­ships. We may be more used to see­ing them in the TV series His Dark Mate­ri­als than in real life, but they offer sig­nif­i­cant oppor­tu­ni­ties to reduce emis­sions. 

One such vehi­cle is the ‘hybrid air­craft’ the Air­lan­der. Man­u­fac­tured by UK-based Hybrid Air Vehi­cles (HAV), approx­i­mate­ly 60% of the aircraft’s lift is gen­er­at­ed by the buoy­an­cy of heli­um (in a tra­di­tion­al air­ship, it would be 100%), with the remain­ing 40% gen­er­at­ed aero­dy­nam­i­cal­ly by the flow of air over the wing-shaped hull.

Sus­tain­abil­i­ty is a strong sell­ing point for air­ships and hybrids, explains Tom Grundy, CEO of HAV. Air­craft using lighter-than-air tech­nol­o­gy are fun­da­men­tal­ly more effi­cient, he says. By lever­ag­ing ‘free lift’ pro­vid­ed by buoy­ant gas, they require sig­nif­i­cant­ly less pow­er, which means low­er fuel burn and few­er emis­sions.

“In logis­tics, there­fore, hybrid air­craft tech­nol­o­gy offers an alter­na­tive that sits between fast, car­bon-inten­sive air freight and slow, low­er car­bon-inten­sive sur­face trans­port.”

HAV plans to have air­craft in ser­vice from 2025. With a 50-tonne pay­load and 30m cab­in length, a ful­ly elec­tric (and amphibi­ous) Air­lan­der 50 could be avail­able by 2033. It would cut CO2 emis­sions by 1.15kg per tonne of freight per km, com­pared to con­ven­tion­al aero­planes.

Lighter-than-air tech­nol­o­gy looks set to do some of the heavy lift­ing in logis­tics.

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Trucking down the e‑highway

When it comes to elec­tric vehi­cles and bat­tery stor­age, HGVs have long been held up as the acid test, giv­en their heavy­weight pow­er demands and long-haul range. Now, though, inno­va­tion is emerg­ing world­wide, via man­u­fac­tur­ers such as Sca­nia and Vol­vo, plus the Tes­la Semi due soon.

The busi­ness case has also been boost­ed by research from Lawrence Berke­ley, UCLA and Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia Berke­ley that found medi­um- and long-haul elec­tric trucks in the US are 13% cheap­er to own than diesel alter­na­tives today and could be almost 50% cheap­er by 2030. So, while total truck num­bers on the road remain small, we might be reach­ing a tech­nol­o­gy tip­ping point, sug­gests San­dra Rol­ing, head of trans­port at envi­ron­men­tal ser­vices com­pa­ny Cli­mate Group.

“Falling bat­tery costs, tech­nol­o­gy trans­fer from oth­er vehi­cle sec­tors (notably elec­tric bus­es), grow­ing inter­est and invest­ment from man­u­fac­tur­ers, plus sup­port­ive pol­i­cy, have all accel­er­at­ed devel­op­ment of medi­um- and heavy-duty zero emis­sion trucks,” she says. “Today, there’s a grow­ing range on the mar­ket in prac­ti­cal­ly all weight and use class­es.”

Indeed, the Cli­mate Group’s EV100 ini­tia­tive has more than 100 major glob­al busi­ness­es com­mit­ted to switch­ing more than 5 mil­lion vehi­cles to elec­tric by 2030. Plus, col­lec­tive ini­tia­tives are under way to find com­mon solu­tions to issues of range anx­i­ety and charg­ing infra­struc­ture.

In Ger­many, mean­while, a con­sor­tium includ­ing TU Berlin, the Fraun­hofer IVI and Bosch is engaged on a three-year project called eHaul, designed to deter­mine whether large swap­pable bat­ter­ies for heavy goods vehi­cles offer a sen­si­ble alter­na­tive for dai­ly trips of more than 300km.

In the UK, the gov­ern­ment has com­mit­ted £2m to a plan for over­head cables to be installed on a 20km stretch of the M180 motor­way near Scun­thor­pe in Lin­colnshire, with a poten­tial three-phase roll­out of these e‑highways planned nation­wide. The project is being led by Costain, with trucks from Sca­nia and elec­tric tech­nol­o­gy from Siemens – both of which have already col­lab­o­rat­ed on tri­als in Ger­many and Swe­den.

Elec­tric high­ways can accel­er­ate progress towards net zero, explains William Wil­son, CEO at Siemens Mobil­i­ty: “Just intro­duc­ing the trucks and vehi­cles alone won’t help us hit decar­bon­i­sa­tion tar­gets and, as a coun­try, we need to go faster and hard­er if we’re to meet the 2050 goal.

“E‑highways are a tried-and-test­ed way of mak­ing it pos­si­ble for clean, effi­cient, elec­tric HGVs to run on motor­ways. They also answer the burn­ing ques­tion of not hav­ing charg­ing infra­struc­ture.”

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