How optimising your delivery process will reduce your carbon footprint

To illustrate the carbon emissions from the delivery industry, we will focus on one area, while considering that there is a multitude of contributors toward the carbon footprint of the delivery industry. In this case, we will look at UK van delivery drivers. The average yearly mileage for each van in 2020 was 21,200 miles per year, and there were 724,435 registered delivery vans. This put the total distance travelled for van deliveries at over 15 billion miles (15,356,114,000 miles to be exact).  

Taken in conjuncture with the fact that 6% of deliveries in the UK fail at the first attempt, we calculate 921,366,840 miles of these delivery trips were on unsuccessful deliveries. While this is patently an area for improvement from a logistical standpoint, it also represents an extensive emissions deficit on wasted delivery trips. In total, these failed delivery journeys churned out 355,987 tonnes of CO2. When considering that transport makes up more than a quarter of the total greenhouse gas emissions in the UK, cutting down on these failed deliveries will make a sizeable difference to the domestic CO2 output.  

42% of businesses are looking to reduce their carbon footprint, and the CO2 emitted on failed deliveries shows that many businesses stand to do more in this area by optimising their delivery processes. Address capture and validation are great ways of fixing failed deliveries. Gymshark are one of our customers to benefit from these solutions, and Sebastian Mills, Head of IT, Gymshark, said:  

“Since using Loqate, we have definitely seen a decrease in failed postal deliveries due to inaccurate address data.”  

As this demonstrates, increasing the effectiveness of the delivery process by reducing failed deliveries with address capture and validation has numerous positive knock-on effects, with the upshot, in this case, being a reduction in carbon footprint. To start reaping the benefits of an optimised delivery process and reduced carbon emissions, you can speak with us today and see how our address capture and validation solution could transform your business for the better.