Grocery Delivery Services Reduce Carbon Dioxide Emissions

SEATTLEUsing an online grocery store delivery service not only is convenient, but it also can reduce carbon dioxide emissions by at least half compared to individual household trips to the store, according to a new study published in the Journal of the Transportation Research Forum.

According to the University of Washington engineers who conducted the study, delivery service trucks produced 20% to 75% less carbon dioxide than corresponding personal vehicles driven to and from a grocery store. Delivery service trucks filled to capacity delivering to customers clustered in neighborhoods, instead of catering to individual household requests for specific time deliveries, produce the most savings for companies with  80% to 90% less carbon dioxide emitted.

For the study, Seattle as a test case to examined whether using a grocery delivery service was better for the environment. Data was compiled from Seattle and King County, assuming every household was a possible delivery-service customer. Researchers randomly drew a portion of those households from that data to identify customers and assign them to their closest grocery store, allowing them to reach across the entire city, without bias toward factors like demographics and income level.

An Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) modeling tool was then used to calculate emissions. Carbon dioxide produced for every mile, for every vehicle was calculated using factors like, vehicle type, speed and roadway type. Emissions reductions were seen across both the densest and more suburban areas of Seattle. This suggests grocery delivery in rural areas could lower carbon dioxide production significantly.

In the future, the UW researchers plan to look at the influence of customers combining their grocery shopping with a work commute trip and the impact of delivery service's home-based location on emissions.

Grocery delivery services are becoming increasingly popular with companies like AmazonFresh, operating in the Seattle area, and FreshDirect, delivering in the New York City area. And with the recently launched, shopping delivery service experiment in the San Francisco Bay area by Google and the UW alumni grocery service, Geniusdelivery, in Seattle.