Sunday 16 May 2004, Eric Cornelis (FUNDP, BE)

Our understanding of the determinants of demand in vehicle-kilometre as well as its consequences on energy consumption and pollution is much less satisfactory for freight than for passenger transport, although effective action in order to reduce the consequences of freight traffic requires a thorough understanding of the factors that motivate logistical choices. Conventional data sources on freight traffics (e.g. administrative data for inland waterways, information delivered by rail companies, truck surveys, etc.) is split mode by mode. These existing data enable a macroeconomic assessment of environmental impacts like TERM reports do, but not an anlysis the factors that explain firms logistical behavior. The first step is to observe energy consumed for the transport of the shipment all along the transport chain for improving the analysis of intermodality. Further on, the whole supply chain has to be considered.

This working Group will analyze the influence of the logistical organization of the firm and of the supply chain on the transport demand and energy consumption that is generated by a certain volume of activity ; it will include the analysis of the households behaviour regarding their freight transport (from supermarkets or shop to home) and the logistics from production to shops. We will also try to find if there exists a link between the behaviours of distribution to shops and the behaviours of customers transporting freight from the shops.

What role does the logistical organization within a supply chain play in the relationship between the economic activity (production or consumption, measured in tonnes), the amount of freight transport produced (in tkm) and the amount of traffic generated (vehicle km), which determines the fuel consumption and the pollution generated by transport? By organization of the logistical chain, we mean the principal choices made by the different participants in the chain (manufacturing sector, distribution and subcontracted carriers and logistics firms) with regard to their own operations (localization, purchase and use of their own vehicle fleet, other equipment, storage policy, subcontracting and modal choice), and with regard to the integration of logistical management throughout the supply chain (subcontracting to a common logistical service provider, information systems and integrated stock management software).

The method will be based on making comparisons between different supply chains with different organizations with regard to the volume of transport generated by a given level of activity and the associated energy consumption.

Task 1: specification of the method

We want to analyse energy consumed for different supply chains, from the producer down to the consumer. Harmonization of the long distance freight approach on the one hand and urban consumer behavior on the other hand will be one of the difficulties. For long distance flow, from production to the market (hypermarket or shops), we shall compare different logistical organizations but which produce the same end product. Products will be selected according to their market (a product “with a world market” and one with a “local” market) and to the level of traffic they generate. Logistical organizations will be selected according to their levels of logistics subcontracting (of transport, storage, management or organization) and degree of logistics integration (shared information systems, common management of stocks and flows). The urban approach is generally per trip and not per product ; so we shall have to set a simple way of assessing part of the trip to a specific product.

Task 2: conduct of a survey from production to the market

Two products and two or three different chains for each of them will be analysed. This involves reconstructing the morphology of logistical chains from suppliers upstream to arrival on the market. We shall consider the impact of each firm or stage in the chain on transport flows and energy consumption as well as its position in the overall organization of logistics, from which stems the need to conduct in-depth interview surveys. The task, for each link in the logistical chain, is to link the volume of traffic, the energy consumption, the players and their strategies. Depending on the complexity of the logistical chain in question, either one or several firms (shippers, service providers, carriers, etc.) will be questioned.

Task 3: household shopping and ‘freight’ transport

The first objective will be to complete the supply chains analysis, from the shop to home. Another purpose will be to obtain a better view of interactions between stakeholders, policies and activities related to the supply and demand of freight transport in urban areas, and in particular of the links between localisation of distributors and the behavior of customers transporting freight from the shops.

Task 4: analysis of the surveys and synthesis

Analysis of the surveys will consist of comparing the different types of logistical organization for chains with the volume of the different physical flows on one hand and with the amount of energy consumed on the other. In particular, we shall attempt to identify which of the observed logistical chains are the most effective in terms of transport demand or energy consumption for a given level of goods production and develop a method for analyzing transport demand over the entire length of logistical chains.