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They clog the streets and often fill up with diesel: parcel services are criticized for their carbon footprint. Packing stations are intended to save CO2. But does the calculation work?
The Swiss Post is investing in order to become more climate-friendly – and probably also to save costs. There will soon be 15,000 instead of the current 12,000 packing stations and 1,000 instead of the current 100 postal stations nationwide.
“This means we can make offers to our customers where they can access the package 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” says Thomas Kutsch, spokesman for Deutsche Post AG. Kutsch also promises that the branch network will not be further reduced.
Packing stations save travel distances
According to Deutsche Post, the packing stations are intended to have a positive effect on the climate: “Climate protection also plays a big role because we save a third of CO2 compared to classic door-to-door delivery. We can deliver up to 100 parcels at the machine in one journey. ”
At Hermes, collection solutions will also play a larger role in the future, explains press spokeswoman Julia Kühnemuth: “By delivering to parcel shops, more parcels can be delivered with significantly fewer journeys.” Traffic and emissions on the so-called “last mile” would be reduced. “Collected delivery to a Hermes ParcelShop causes on average 25 percent less CO2 than delivery to a private door.”
Real climate protection or sugarcoating?
Kathrin Zabel, the managing director of the PropaketBox association, does not believe that the industry giants’ systems really save that much CO2: “That’s only true for their own climate footprint, because the delivery vehicles no longer have to drive to every house. But a crucial aspect is being kept secret : Customers have to drive to the station and pick up the package, which creates additional traffic.”
Research shows that a doorstep delivery actually produces less CO2 than driving many private cars to the station. This is due to better vehicle utilization by delivery services and more efficient route design.
Provider-free parcel box as an alternative
Zabel’s association is promoting a different solution: the so-called provider-free parcel box, to which all service providers have access. The system is located like a mailbox directly at the customer’s home, and every delivery service can place its packages there, which has the effect that every customer is always reachable – there is no need for repeated delivery attempts.
According to the association, such parcel boxes now have more than 400,000 compartments nationwide, which are used by an estimated 1.8 million people. “This saves around a minute of time per parcel. Extrapolated, this means that we need 2,000 fewer deliveries every day nationwide, which means there are 2,000 fewer vehicles on the road spreading their exhaust fumes,” calculates Zabel.
Integrate trams and cargo bikes?
Relief is urgently needed because the number of parcels in Germany is increasing dramatically. While just under 2.8 billion packages were delivered in 2014, forecasts predict that there will be nine billion by 2028. For delivery services, the issue of environmentally friendly delivery to customers will become increasingly pressing in the coming years.
For this reason, the University of Applied Sciences in Frankfurt is researching solutions: “For example, we are investigating how we can also integrate the tram system,” says scientist Dennis Knese. “The parcels are transported from the depot on the outskirts of the city by train to the center, where they are transferred onto a cargo bike and then transported to the end customer.” According to the researchers, this can reduce CO2 emissions by around 57 percent compared to conventional delivery.
“In the end it’s usually just about the costs”
However, the University of Applied Sciences model would mean an increase in staff and therefore costs for parcel service providers. For this reason, too, according to Knese, development is progressing slowly: “All companies are open to innovations and very interested. Of course, the question is always, what about the money?” says the sustainable mobility expert. “Every company is currently under pressure to act, they all have their sustainability goals, they have to become greener, they have to become more climate-friendly, but in the end it’s usually just about the costs when it comes to implementation.”
And because of them, many good ideas fail. So there is still a long way to go until climate-friendly parcel delivery. According to experts, you can also do something yourself: for example, ride your bike to the neighborhood store.