Being Green > Reducing Fuel and Greenhouse Gases from Transportation
More than half of our revenue in our primary market – North America – is generated through deliveries. We have a substantial number of vehicles on the road every day delivering products to customers and the fuel used to deliver these products adds up to one of our most material environmental impacts. Reducing fuel and greenhouse gases from transportation is a primary objective and we are proud to have taken a leadership position in our industry in this area.
At the end of 2007, we were:
- The only office products company in North America to have calculated carbon emissions from deliveries.
- The only office products company to have reported two consecutive years of substantial reduction in carbon emissions from transportation (11.8% reduction in 2006 and 9.6% reduction in 2007).
- The only office products company to be able to calculate the average estimated carbon emissions from delivery of office supplies to customers (scope 3).
- The only company with a substantial fleet of fuel-efficient Sprinter vans.
As an active partner in the US EPA’s Smartway Transportation Partnership, we used Smartway’s FLEET Model to quantify our fuel use and carbon footprint. We shipped at least 50% of our goods using SmartWay Transport Carriers and implemented fuel reduction strategies such as no-idling policies at docks and active use of inter-modal transportation.
Based on our leadership efforts in 2007, Office Depot was awarded a SmartWay Environmental Excellence Award. We were the only office products company to win this award and the only shipper overall in the SmartWay partnership to track greenhouse gases from distribution. Using the unique carbon insight we have gained through these efforts, we plan to develop solutions that encourage customers to consolidate orders and reduce delivery frequency and corresponding carbon emissions.