Greenspoon Weekly Blog is a brand new column by our Greenspoon Team that covers lifestyle related content ranging from our environment, lifestyle, health and food ! Each week , expect a thought provoking, informative blog that we hope will be useful to you!
Electric vehicles (EVs) are an important part of meeting global goals on climate change. From the loss of sea ice and the increase in sea levels to the occurrence of extreme events such as hurricanes, droughts or intensive heat waves, it’s hard to deny the dimension of what we are fighting here. And there’s more to come if we reach the temperature increase of 2° Celsius.
In an attempt to minimize these consequences, scientists have been looking into what may be the main causes of climate change. They found out that greenhouse gases (GHG) like carbon dioxide, methane or nitrous oxide, and aerosols are changing the atmosphere and leaving the planet more exposed.
As cars make up 72% of the Co2 emissions in this sector (followed by planes, with 10%), the market of electric cars has been growing and seems to be a good solution to fight climate change.
ONLINE SHOPPING VERSUS PHYSICAL SHOPPING
People are usually surprised when they hear that online grocery shopping is way more eco-friendly than going to a brick & mortar store. There are three main reasons we’ve pinned down to support this:
- Lower inbound carbon impact (because of centralized warehousing).
- Lower food waste (because of centralized warehousing as well as on-demand ordering and better stock management.
- Low delivery & storage carbon intensity (our warehouse is utilized more efficiently (e.g. no open fridges) and has no unnecessary lighting.
- Let’s zoom in on the last one: delivery. We estimate currently: the carbon footprint of a Greenspoon delivery is four times lower than a traditional car delivery. Given our usage of electric vehicles.
GREENSPOON ZERO EMMISIONS GOAL
With Greenspoon we are committed to have zero emissions in deliveries in 2023. Our masterplan is to have:
- Our electric vans to get goods into neighborhoods
- And use electric last mile delivery with electric bicycles for further destinations.
This has never been done before in Kenya – so we are working hard to make this work – despite no government incentives, charging network, bicycle paths and whatever! Our EV fleet is growing and our electric bicycles will be tested in the most congested area in Nairobi (Lavington area) coming week. With your support this Christmas we can accelerate the transition and get real fresh and green delivery to you! Let us know if you have other great ideas that can help us accelerate our audacious goals!
Our vans typically do 30 deliveries on a 100 km trip a day and therefore use 15 kWh for that. With a carbon intensity of 116 g/kWh which is much lower with solar PV on our warehouse we emit 58g CO2 per delivery. In comparison, to if we used traditional vehicles, under the assumption that one uses 1 liter of petrol to do grocery shopping (the average consumption in Nairobi ~1 in 10 km), that then emits 2392 grams which is a whopping forty one times!
WHAT NEXT ?
By changing the way we shop, or the vehicles we drive we will definitely create a positive impact to the environment. Making small changes to our lifestyles, whether individually or as corporates especially those within the logistics sector, will help ensure we are in the right path of reversing climate change.
Source
