A Comparative Study to Examine the Feasibility and Climate Benefits of Transporting Mycronic´s Products Using More Sustainable Transport Solutions

Abstract: As per the Paris agreement in 2015, 190 nations have joined the cause to cut the Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. To limit global warming, the aim is to reduce the global emissions to half by 2030 compared to 2012 and reach net zero by 2050. The transportation industry can play a big role to achieve this target. The freight transportation sector need to reduce the emissions by 20% (5.7 Gt) by 2030 compared to 2020 (7.2Gt) in order to reach the Net Zero Emissions goal by 2050[1]. At Mycronic group, freight transportation operations generate the third largest GHG and CO2 emissions after customer use of products and Material use. Most of the in-bound and out-bound deliveries are carried out by air freight. Air freight creates the highest emissions out of all the freight transport systems. To reduce the use of air freight and meet the requirements of global agreement, Mycronic group aims to deliver products in more sustainable and effective ways. Hence, this study aims to find less carbon-intensive shipping solutions for outbound deliveries of Mycronic products. A comparative study of current freight logistics system and a more sustainable system has been carried for one of the Mycronic AB divisions’ products and specific to outbound deliveries from Sweden to USA. Study of future trends of freight transport system in terms of sustainability with respect to upcoming technology, policies and initiatives have been carried out. For the calculation of emissions, a third-party proprietary software was used to analyse and compare the sustainable solutions. Product forecasting and the making of a tCO2e calculation sheet for salespeople were also carried out as support for the company to implement the suggested solution.Shipping of products through waterways is much more sustainable compared to other transport modes and that it should therefore be adopted more often to deliver products. A multi-modal transport system, including shipping by sea freight and further combined by road or rail freight found to be the most efficient solution to reduce the emissions. To adopt this solution, the main challenges appeared are the client acceptance for longer lead times and organizational behaviour change within Mycronic group. The technical requirements of the product analysed in this study did not prove to be an issue for transporting the product by waterways.