Reducing a firm's climate impact from transport by half - what adaptations and collaborations make it possible?

Research Project, 2022 – 2027

The suggested study aims at investigating what an individual firm can do to reduce the carbon emissions resulting from the transports embedded in their supply chains by half. Previous studies show how the purchasing functions of firms impact transport both directly – through their purchases of transport services - and indirectly, through what they buy and how they buy various products and from what suppliers. Apart from firm internal factors affecting transport, a range of external factors also set the terms, such as the suppliers’ locations, the transport infrastructure, the transport providers’ offerings as well as their other customers’ demands. The possibilities to reduce the transport emissions upstream are also influenced by that transport is often included in the product offering which means that the transport activities are not visible for, or known by, the buying company. This limited ‘horizon’ entails difficulties for buying companies to be aware of how their purchasing behaviour impacts the transport activities embedded in their supply chains as well as of what they can do to reduce the climate impact resulting from these transport activities.
The suggested study, carried out as a PhD project, is an in-depth study of the possibilities to dramatically reduce the climate impact of the transport activities embedded in the supply chains of a company, through firm internal adjustments and in collaboration with various partners such as suppliers, transport providers and other actors. Both possibilities and challenges are analysed as well as how the focal company and its partners might be influenced by changing conditions e.g., increasing costs of transport, and how these changes influence the choice of measures taken to reduce the climate effects of transport.