Our why
Tackling congestion and pollution due to the transport of food in urban areas is an issue of concern in the 21st century as we face the challenge of transitioning towards Net Zero and an ever growing urban population. There is a significant amount of research which highlights the importance of tackling these issues including:
Globally, food is responsible for approximately 26% of global greenhouse gas emissions, of which 6% is attributable to distribution (Ritchie, 2019).
In the UK where our main business operates, 35% of greenhouse gases come from the food sector (WRAP, 2021) with miles driven due to moving food responsible for 25% of all truck miles (DEFRA and AEA Technology, 2005).
London, where our main business operates, is facing the ever growing threat of air pollution. Road transport has been one of the main areas targeted by the Mayor of London to tackle this issue (WRI, 2021).
Commercial vehicles are also responsible for a third of transportation emissions globally, highlighting the important role of distribution businesses in reducing supply chain emissions in the transition towards Net Zero (Chauhan et al., 2022; SMMT, 2021).
As a first step in the journey towards reducing harmful environmental impact attributable to our deliveries, we set out to measure what matters - our emissions.
The study
Our journey to track our delivery emissions kicked off in the summer of 2022 with a deep dive alongside carbon accounting experts at Greenly. We wanted to get a clear snapshot of the emissions linked to our deliveries—covering our patented Points of Distribution (POD) model, our traditional method, and a typical competitor's method.
As we later learned, our initial approach was a bit too thorough. We included emissions from drivers' commutes, vehicle amortisation, and empty return journeys—elements of the deliveries that aren't directly under our control, especially given that we don't own the vehicles in our supply chain. Fast-forward to 2024, and after consulting Net Zero experts at Qonstrue, we realised we were overestimating our delivery emissions. With their guidance, we recalibrated our calculations to focus only on what really matters: the journey from our warehouse to your doorstep, in line with the GHG Protocol for Transport Emissions. Driver commutes, amortisation*, and empty trips? Gone.
While fine-tuning, we also refreshed our vehicle emissions data to reflect the latest UK figures and updated the energy emissions from our PODs as usage has ramped up since 2022. Plus, we revisited our competitor analysis to compare apples to apples. We defined a typical competitor's last-mile journey from central hub to customer, assuming they use a refrigerated 3.5T diesel van loaded to 70% capacity, and calculated the average journey distances based on our own direct delivery data in lieu of competitor data.
Following the completion of the updated study, we saw the difference between emissions produced per kg of product shipped via both our current last-mile delivery methods and that of a typical competitor. We took these findings and updated our calculator to continuously track and share emissions attributable to the transport of food in the last-mile.
*POD amortisation is accounted for in our annual company-wide greenhouse gas assessments.
The results
Based on our updated calculations, we found that Collectiv Food's POD model can avoid up to nearly 74% of emissions in the last-mile compared to a competitor. This is based on a typical competitor producing 47.2 gCO2e per kg of food shipped compared to as low as 12.3 gCO2e per kg of food shipped via POD at its optimum.
The results highlight two critical factors in realising the full reduction potential of the POD model: increasing volume shipped via PODs and moving towards 100% electric vehicles in the journeys from PODs to customer locations.
What the data means for you
As a Collectiv Food customer, last-mile delivery emissions reported by us make up part of your Scope 3 emissions (read more about your different emissions scopes here).
To help you understand the positive environmental impact of your deliveries, we also provide the total last-mile delivery emissions avoided versus competitors specific to your orders. We do so by subtracting the total emissions produced of shipping a given amount of food (kg) via a typical competitor as defined above and the emissions produced of shipping the same amount of food by PODs or our direct methods.
As a Collectiv Food customer, you'll have ongoing access to personalised emissions data via your Sustainability Hub in the Collectiv Food App and via your tailored Impact Reports. This data enables you to identify factors contributing to your delivery emissions, track emissions avoided over time and support you in your journey to Net Zero.
Limitations and future improvements
There are limitations to every calculation. A given vehicle may have to do an emergency delivery due to unforeseen circumstances. Variations like these are not currently included in the calculation. Likewise, the precise transport method from POD to customer, be it a cargo bike, electric van or diesel van is not taken into account due to current limitations of tracking this data in real time. Instead, emissions attributable to this leg of POD deliveries are calculated on the basis of a monthly average of deliveries done by each type of vehicle.
As we work to reduce the emissions attributable to our deliveries, significant changes are reflected in the delivery emissions factors for our POD and direct delivery methods, both of which are updated on a regular basis as part of ensuring our calculations remain accurate and up-to-date, reflecting our ever-changing supply chain.
Looking ahead, we are committed to realising the full reduction potential of our POD model and strengthening its role in enabling cleaner and safer cities. Investing in additional innovation to support this, whether that's exploring evolving technology to phase our diesel or solar panels to power the energy of the PODs, our commitment is clear: to drive continuous improvement and set a new benchmark for urban food distribution.
