Calculate and reduce the environmental impact of your transport chain
What is the impact of its freight transport chain on the environment? How to limit it? The French leader in TMS “Transport Management System”, DDS Logistics has just developed a “CO2 Emissions Management” module capable of calculating greenhouse gas emissions generated by a multimodal transport chain. This indicator can also simulate and propose the most suitable ecologically and economically transport plan according to the least polluting modes and the most advantageous in terms of cost, time and quality of service.
The Transport sector is, in France, the leading consumer of petroleum products and the leading emitter of CO2 (34% of national emissions) with more than 141 million tonnes in 2005 *! A figure that has almost doubled since 1973, according to Ademe. Main implicated, road transport. In 2003, it alone generated 130 million tonnes of CO2 in the region. “Today, vehicles consume less and pollute less, but goods traffic, in terms of volumes and distances traveled, has increased a lot in recent years. Limiting the environmental impact of transport is a challenge for the sector ”, underlines Jérôme Bour, President of DDS Logistics. "Especially since, in the long term, the creation of a CO2 emissions permit that would affect the logistics chain could be confirmed ..."
One of the solutions is to promote combined modes of transport (rail-road, maritime, etc.), a rebalancing of transport modes, with the revitalization of rail and the promotion of maritime and river transport as recommended by the European Commission ** .
Economic and ecological simulation with the new DDS Logistics module
In a logic of anticipation, DDS Logistics has developed around DDS Shipper, its TMS for shippers, a module capable of simulating and calculating the emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases (N2O, O3) from transport chains freight. Whatever the modes of transport used, and at all stages: from suppliers of parts or raw materials to factories and then to customers. “The objective is to offer users of our solution the possibility of choosing their modes of transport and service providers on the basis of environmental criteria, and to statistically monitor the ecological balance of transport operations,” explains Jérôme Bour. The aim is to provide shippers with the means to favor the least polluting freight transport schemes, such as combined rail-road or maritime transport. "
From an economic point of view, users benefit from this: the module can integrate the criteria of cost, time and quality of service to develop the proposed transport plan. The monitoring and management of freight are thereby strengthened.
In summary, the module allows to:
- Calculate the CO2 emissions by type of transport used. The calculation is carried out in tonnes of CO2 equivalent, all gases not having the same effect. Thus, a kilogram of methane (CH4) contributes 21 times more to the greenhouse effect than a kilogram of CO2, and a kilogram of nitrous oxide (N2O) 310 times more. DDS Shipper will therefore allocate an equivalent quantity of CO2 emitted for each t / km traveled, depending on the mode of transport. The calculation of emissions relating to each mode of transport is based in particular on the Ademe emission factors guide, a guide used by the Bilan Carbone® method.
- Calculate the CO2 emissions in a multimodal chain involving several modes of transport: The objective is to be able to assess the total quantity of CO2 emitted on the different sections of a transport chain, for example from parts suppliers to factories and then to customers, looking at all the modes of transport used. To achieve this, DDS Shipper relies on its transport chain models, which describe the successive steps to achieve an end-to-end operation.
- Calculate the CO2 emissions for each goods transported in a multimodal chain, DDS Shipper making it possible to follow the details of the quantities of products in each transport.
- Automatically choose the mode and the transport plan according to a combination of criteria: CO2 emissions, cost, time, quality of service.
- Carry out statistical monitoring of CO2 emissions across the entire transport network, in particular to measure on an annual scale the effect of the choices made by the shipper on his transport plan.
… And to promote its image, its products and its profession.
Jérôme Bour, President of DDS Logistics, is the initiator of this new module "Management of CO2 emissions", which reconciles environmental and economic issues.
Why did you develop this new module?
DDS Logistics publishes transport and international trade software packages. We are the French leader in TMS. Shippers use our solutions to optimize the organization and management of their transport activity. A sector that is heavily involved in greenhouse gas emissions. We wanted to develop a solution that reconciles sustainable development by offering the possibility of calculating and thus limiting the impact of its transport on the environment, but also on economic reality. The two aspects are not incompatible, but the trade-off between cost and environmental impact is up to each charger according to its strategy or market. What we want is to provide shippers with the tool that will allow them to apply this strategy to transport and to measure its effect.
Can you give us an example of the transport diagram proposed by the module?
A typical case is the comparison between a direct road diagram and a river diagram. In fact, the river plan always includes a pre and a post-road transport which must also be taken into account in the calculation of CO2 emissions and the total cost.
In your opinion, is combined transport the solution to reducing CO2 emissions?
It is in any case an interesting alternative to consider facing the "all road". Combined rail-road or maritime transport are less polluting than road transport alone. The Ademe thus estimates that “combined rail-road transport has avoided in France (…) around 600 tonnes of CO000 over the year” in 2 (Ademe website). But rail is not the only alternative: we are seeing a definite return from our customers by river, which is now more flexible than rail.
DDS-Logistics
DDS Logistics is a publisher of transport and international trade software packages. French leader in TMS, it develops two solutions: DDS Shipper and DDS Freight. DDS Shipper responds to supply and transport issues for shippers, by ensuring complete management of international trade and multimodal transport (from referencing to final delivery), by optimizing flows and their tracing, by offering a global vision of the supply chain and monitoring of financial flows linked to its operations, by determining the delivered cost of a product. Intended for freight forwarders and 3 HGVs, DDS Freight allows complete management of air, sea and road activities, and of the international logistics organization by ensuring integration between all stakeholders. It covers both transport aspects (flow tracing, management of transport documents, etc.) and customs, but also all sales and purchase operations for export and import.
www.ddslogistics.com
Tuesday July 14 2009
Source and CFO-news editorial staff
Thank you for the info.