Eco-Friendly Tips For Freight Transportation

With the extreme effects of climate change becoming more apparent by the day, every industry bears the responsibility to reassess its environmental footprint. The freight transport sector has started taking steps towards sustainability. Yet between diesel trucks, congested highways, inefficient routes, and dated policies, substantial room for eco-friendly improvement remains.

In this article, we will break down actionable solutions freight carriers large and small can implement to shrink their carbon impact. We will cover best practices across.

• Fleet optimisation
• Equipment enhancements
• Alternative energy adoption
• Supply chain collaboration
• Driver engagement and policies

From quick policy changes to long-term capital investments, the coming decades require every freight transport organisation to embed environmental stewardship into their operating ethos. Let us explore how.

Rightsising Your Fleet

The easiest direct emission cuts often come from aligning truck capacity with shipment volumes. For non-balanced freight transport, carriers commonly suffer from three mismatches-

1. More trucks or trailers than necessary along a route due to declining volumes or seasonality. The excess equipment still consumes fuel and mileage during repositioning.
   
2. Oversised vehicles for typical shipment weights and dimensions along a lane. Think half-full 53-foot trailers.
   
3. Inefficient trailer-to-tractor ratios result in unnecessary solo tractor movements.

Carriers should start by scrutinising their fleet size and utilisation rates across geographic zones. If equipment sits unused for more than 10-20 per cent of operating hours, sightseeing opportunities likely exist via-

• Removing or reallocating underutilised assets – Scale your fleet geographically to match year-round volumes. Reassign tractors and trailers between zones based on seasonal demand shifts. Sell or lease out unused portions during slower periods.
  
• Standardising optimal vehicle configurations – Analyse average shipment sizes, destination networks, and backhaul needs. Potentially shift towards smaller, more volumetrically efficient equipment.
  
• Improving trailer-to-tractor ratios – Local P&D routes may allow a single tractor to service multiple trailers per day rather than making the return trip solo.

Proactively rightsising your fleet not only reduces upfront capital costs but also limits ongoing fuel consumption, mileage-based maintenance, and toll road charges. Greenfleets, GPS Insight, and other fleet optimisation platforms now ease data gathering and analysis to identify savings.

Enhancing Equipment Aerodynamics And Efficiency

Along with maximising asset utilisation, ensuring vehicles operate as efficiently as possible per mile also pays dividends. As worm gears, A/C systems, and auxiliary power units consume over 20 per cent of diesel use, seemingly minor upgrades make an environmental impact. Consider enhancements like-

• Low Rolling Resistance Tires – Increase fuel economy by 1-4 per cent by lowering heat generation and drag. Maintain through proper tire pressure.
  
• Aerodynamic Exterior Additions – Trailer side skirts, rear-mounted boat tails, gap fairings, and roof fairings reshape airflow. Boost MPG by 5 per cent.
  
• Automatic Tire Inflation Systems – Ensure perfect tire pressure across your fleet to avoid wasted fuel from drag. Saves up to 1.5 per cent in diesel.
  
• Auxiliary Power Units – Cut idling fuel use by 30-50 per cent by powering heating, cooling, and cab electrical through secondary engines or batteries during mandatory rest periods.
  
• Ultra Lightweight Components – Swap steel and aluminium parts with high-strength carbon fibre and composites to reduce vehicle weight. Each 10 per cent reduction boosts fuel economy by 6-8 per cent based on physics.
  
• Improved Lubricants – Lower-viscosity synthetic oils and greases cut internal drag on engine and drivetrain components.

Though more minor enhancements individually, collectively these improvements slash long-run costs. EPA SmartWay and other green freight programs provide carrier discounts and subsidies to accelerate adoption.

Exploring Alternative Fuel Options For Freight Transport

Though still early stage, alternative fuel vehicles offer a growing opportunity to neutralise emissions for carriers. Each comes with distinct pros, cons, and key considerations-

Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) And Liquified Natural Gas (LNG)

• 3o per cent cheaper per diesel gallon equivalent (DGE)
• 17-21 per cent less carbon dioxide emitted
• Limited fueling infrastructure remains a bottleneck

Biodiesel

• Draws from renewable feedstocks like plant oils and tallow
• Can power existing diesel engines in blends
• Risk of higher NOx emissions depending on the blend

Ethanol–

• Mainly used for shorter-range vehicles given lower energy density
• Requires compatible engines and fuel systems
• Can use existing gas station infrastructure

Electric Vehicles

• Zero emissions and smoother performance
• Limited range and charging infrastructure for long-haul needs
• Best suited for short and medium-duty urban routes

Hydrogen Fuel Cells

• The only byproduct is water so pure zero emissions
• It provides steady torque like diesel without noise
• Extremely high costs and minimal fueling stations slow the adoption

Carriers must assess their operating environments—route lengths, home basing, duty cycles, freight transport volumes etc. to identify the optimal alt fuel applications per vehicle. Hybrid approaches may work best near term, leveraging diesel for highway miles and electric drives for urban delivery cycles.

Building supply chain collaboration between shippers and carrier partners also helps determine optimal regional alt fuel plans based on route density, loading capacity, and volumes.

Coordinating Logistics Networks Holistically

While individual carrier improvements matter, far greater emissions savings come from network-level optimisation across shippers, warehouses, and transport companies. Material handling often accounts for 50+ of supply chain carbon due to wasteful flows.

Too often firms make transportation decisions in isolation, sending LTL shipments on dedicated routes or prioritising cost over collective efficiency. New coordination strategies like collaborative dispatch offer more sustainable flows via shared transport capacity. Shippers could offset outbound volumes with other firms’ backhauls along lanes to maximise vehicle fills. This holistic planning dramatically concentrates freight miles into fewer highly utilised trips.

Carriers also minimise empty repositioning and unused miles through better central planning, such as

• Optimally pre-positioning equipment to minimise deadheads between loads
• Offering pricing incentives to balance traffic and assets regionally
• Using integrated scheduling technology to sequence customer delivery times nearby runs

Far greater carbon savings come from intelligently sharing capacity across partners than individual greening attempts. This requires proactively aligning business priorities for collaborative advantage.

Incentivising Drivers Towards Sustainability

Even the most modernised fleet produces unnecessary emissions if drivers exhibit wasteful behaviour. While technology enables efficiency, human factors still dominate mpg variability between operators. Intelligent coaching and incentive plans that promote mindful driving habits are essential to fully capitalise on fleet enhancements.

• Telematics Monitoring And Feedback– Track harsh events like hard braking and acceleration. Use reports to coach drivers on refinements. Gamify fuel-efficiency scores between fleet operators.
  
• Bonus Payments For Fuel Performance– Tie a percentage of driver compensation to achieving certain mpg thresholds on standard routes to promote care.
  
• Eco Mode And Optimal Gear Shift Indicators– Signal to operators the most efficient accelerator percentages and shift points.
  
• No-idling Policies– Enforce five-minute limits on idling during stops and provide auxiliary power hookups.

Receiving continuous feedback nudges more economical habits over time. Even a 5-10 per cent improvement per driver can cascade fleetwide. Carriers like Schneider National estimate training enabled up to 20 per cent mpg gains.

Reevaluating Shipping Routes And Modes

Major network efficiencies also come from optimising shipping routes within a carrier’s network and reconsidering modal shifts. As certain regions become more route-dense with deliveries, existing road maps likely need realignment. Consider-

• Dynamic Route Optimisation – Leverage GPS, telematics data, and algorithmic tools to map the highest density delivery patterns. Shorten stem miles without compromising service.
  
• Point-to-point Shipping – When volumes warrant, evaluate whether direct shipping between hubs makes more sense than routing through cross-docks. Verify efficiencies outweigh changeover costs.
  
• Intermodal Shifts – Analyse volumes to see if dedicated trains or barges between cargo hubs optimise the carbon tradeoffs better than sticking to trucks and aircraft. The math will differ by scenario.

While redesigned networks may seem primarily a cost play initially, smarter regional flows ultimately consolidate miles. This reduces fuel needs long-term even if requiring some upfront reconfiguration investment. Companies like Blue Yonder and Optimor specialise in unearthing these buried green opportunities within freight systems. They peg typical savings between 10-30 per cent from better Choreography.

Improving Last-Mile Efficiency And Densification

The last mile of deliveries notoriously suffers from bloated mileage as drivers crisscross neighbourhoods making individual stops. Urban density provides options to shrink the associated emissions through route planning enhancements such as:

• Dynamic Optimisation – Use algorithms to sequence daily deliveries based on proximity instead of static customer lists.
  
• Rightsied Vehicles– Deploy smaller vans and electric vehicles for residential routes vs. using large delivery trucks.
  
• Density Analysis – Identify geographic clusters eligible for smaller distribution satellites to localise deliveries.
  
• Multistop Routes – Design paths allowing single vehicles to service greater densities of customers with fewer dispatching.
  
• Delivery Windows – Offer customers varied appointment windows to concentrate stops and smooth driver workload.
  
• Pickup/Drop-off Locations – Site parcel lockers/collection points in multi-occupancy areas to share trips between multiple properties as opposed to individual dwellings.
  
• Backhauling – Pick up returns and recyclables during regular delivery activities to defray separate reverse logistics carbon costs.

As carriers enhance last-mile planning, they drive up stops per mile while reducing unnecessary turns, mileage, and solo trips that drag down efficiency. This significantly concentrates on metro freight transport impacts.

Pursuing Ongoing Emission Improvements

This covers the major areas for freight transport carriers to target emission reductions within their existing operations. The cumulative effect of better asset utilisation, vehicle realignment, equipment improvements, coordination of logistics, driver training, modal insights, route improvements and capacity sharing significantly reduces supply chain carbon emissions.

And the opportunities will only expand as innovative technologies and collaborative business models emerge. We encourage all carriers to pick off the low-hanging fruit first with tactical changes that set the stage for bolder transformations ahead.

However,  the journey starts today. Every freight transport carrier must challenge assumptions internally and collaborate externally to maximise incentives for greening. This builds a necessary foundation for the coming decades as environmental performance increasingly guides commercial success.