UPS has goals for reducing fuel use and emissions. How is it doing?
According to its own website, UPS operates some 94,542 ground vehicles worldwide. The company's fleet strategy is to be on the forefront of developing next-gen delivery vehicles that leverage alternative fuel technology and cut back on consumption and emissions. Recent examples of the company's foray into alt-tech include its trials of hydraulic hybrid and hybrid-electric brown delivery trucks.
So, how is the company doing in this regard? Eh, so-so. According to its own data, UPS used a bit more fuel in 2006 than it did the prior year. Considering its huge vehicle fleet, miles driven and packages delivered, though, the difference seems small. Still, it wasn't an improvement by any measure.
How about emissions? The company's stated goal is to "decrease total CO2 emissions produced by our operations" as new, fuel-efficient technologies become available. In the short term, the focus is on reducing emissions per package delivered. In this area, UPS again showed no improvement from 2005 to 2006. Instead, it states that CO2 emissions increased by 6.6% as a result of growth in both ground and air delivery volume.
Through it all, however, it really does appear that UPS is genuinely trying to improve. It only makes sense that it would want to reduce the amount of fuel it's using, because that saves money. Over time, by burning less fuel and replacing its fleet with newer vehicles sporting improved emissions equipment, the company's fleet CO2 output should improve as well. We'll just have to keep our eyes on UPS' progress and see if it meets its goals for this year. What can brown do for us?
[Source: UPS]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Pessimist For Life 2:10PM (8/21/2007)
They better not cut numbers; who else is gonna deliver my RROD 360?
Reply
Michael 3:07PM (8/21/2007)
You note they have used more fuel this year as opposed to last. My question is, are they using less fuel per vehicle? If they are using 44,000 fewer gallons a year by using hybrids, that's good. That's a savings for them of over $100K a year. Once they roll out more hydraulic hybrids and the costs come down, they'll be looking at some real savings in the coming years.
Reply
beelzabush666 3:42PM (8/21/2007)
How can you analyze fuel usage without comparing miles driven? without that this article says nothing.
Reply
Joseph 9:35PM (8/21/2007)
UPS, in my opinion, should have their fleet vehicles go electric.
A very simple, very cheap electric delivery van would run on a few dozen 6 volt golf cart batteries that are cheap, recycalbe, last about 4 years with careful use, and are very forgiving to abuse.
An electric delivery van using 6 volt batteries would have decent range (maybe 100 miles), and have terrible acceleration. And don't all delivery cans have a terrible accelration? Thus, making a perfect fit.
The only thing is that I don't know if 100 miles of range is good enough for an electric delivery van...
Reply
Domenick 5:15PM (8/21/2007)
I'd like to know how many miles a typical UPS truck does each day. Any UPS drivers out there?
I think Smith Electric should build them 50,000 trucks. Goal met and exceeded. Any billionaires out there who could finance the front end of this?
Reply
rgseidl 6:33AM (8/22/2007)
Poorly written article, it does not mention energy expended per package or unit of revenue. Nor does it mention changes in the competitive environment, specifically demand for more rapid delivery (= shorter turnaround time at airports) and a shift from commercial toward residential service. Details are at this link squirreled away in the article:
http://www.sustainability.ups.com/environmental/energy.html
Asessing UPS' progress toward sustainability based solely on absolute CO2 emissions makes no sense whatsoever.
Reply
NT 10:10AM (8/22/2007)
Joseph,
No, 100 miles is not nearly good enough for a delivery van. 200 might be good for the majority of city routes. Some rural routes can be as high as 400 miles per day. Battery capacity would need to meet those requirements. It would not be acceptable for a truck to have to stop in the middle of it's pickups and deliveries to recharge. I suspect thats why FedEx and UPS are primarily interested in hybrids at this time.
That being said, delivery vehicles are operationally a good fit for being electrically powered because they return to the same station every night and there is plenty of time for them to be recharged at night because they have to sit in the station to wait to be loaded with the next days packages.
Reply
John 11:38PM (11/16/2007)
I'm a UPS driver. I only drive about 40 miles a day, making 115 deliveries.
Reply