Environmental responsibility important for haulage firms
It has become increasingly important for haulage firms to show that they want to, and can, take their environmental responsibilities seriously. That is why Volvo Trucks is offering its customers a comprehensive declaration of how the company’s trucks impact the environment. Volvo Trucks is the only truck maker to provide such a service. “Demand from our customers for detailed information about our trucks’ climate and environmental footprint has increased in recent years,” says Lars Mårtensson, Environmental Director at Volvo Trucks.
Volvo's EPD (Environmental Product Declaration) was launched back in 2001 in connection with the launch of the company's new FH and FM trucks. The EPD service has been steadily developed ever since. Recently, lifecycle analysis of the FE and FL models was also concluded so now there is an environmental product declaration for the full range of Volvo's trucks.
"After almost ten years, we are still the only vehicle manufacturer in the world to offer customers this type of information," says Lars Mårtensson.
Companies that care about land usage, water quality and mankind's need for clean air will win in the long term. This is the firm belief of researcher Oskar Villani, President of SDI-Research (Sustainable Development Research Institute) in Vienna, who conducts market, trend and future-scenario analyses for corporate clients.
He relates that the first seeds of the environmental trend were sown as long ago as 1972 when scientist Dennis Meadows and several colleagues published a report entitled "The Limits to Growth". This was the first time the Earth's limited resources and the need to reduce environmental destruction were spotlighted.
"It often takes 30 to 40 years for a trend to establish itself on a broad front among the general public, among legislators and in industry. Now we can finally see that something is starting to happen with the environmental issue," says Oskar Villani.
For the past decade or so, increasing amounts of environmental legislation has been introduced in Europe, the USA and Japan. In 2004, for instance, the EU adopted an environmental responsibility directive that now compels companies within the Union to clean up polluted soil, polluted water and other environmental parameters that have become hazardous to human beings and/or animal life as a result of corporate operations.
Oskar Villani cannot see any end to the environmental trend even though he notes that some companies are moving their polluting operations to countries with more or less non-existent eco-legislation.
"There is a good chance that the economy will grow in environmentally-aware companies and in companies that ally themselves with them. However, pro-environmental technology costs money, environmental awareness always demands a certain level of welfare and the poorer sections of the world cannot afford to adopt the same high standards."
He adds that the path this trend takes in future will depend on the way the richer countries handle the competitive disadvantage brought about by this strict eco-legislation and the expensive investments in more eco-friendly production.
Not least the transport sector, which accounts for a significant portion of the planet's carbon dioxide emissions, must adapt to the new eco-awareness that is sweeping across the world's richer countries. Volvo Trucks already takes considerable environmental responsibility and will continue along that path.
"We have to think about the environment, our resources and future generations. This is a major part of the driving force behind our work to minimise the truck's environmental impact," says Lars, "But it is also a demand from our customers."
"The demand for detailed information about our trucks' climate and environmental footprint has increased in recent years. This information is easily accessible via an interactive service on our website," Lars adds.
Using this information the truck owner can make detailed calculations of such parameters as production, all the way from initial extraction of raw materials to processing of the materials used both in Volvo Trucks' own plants and in its various suppliers' factories throughout Europe. Production-related transportation too is included.
"EPD shows that the way the truck is used plays a major role. Everything that affects fuel consumption, such as driving style, servicing and the type of fuel used, can be monitored by EPD. This tool shows the importance of examining and understanding the whole picture and realising what one can do to influence the overall picture. It is this holistic view and these lifecycle analyses that are the important ingredients in Volvo's work on future-scenario solutions," states Lars Mårtensson.
The EPD tool is divided into five sections: materials and production, fuel, exhaust emissions, maintenance and end-of life handling, that is to say recycling.
Recycling is an important part of Volvo Trucks' pro-environmental work. Today more than 90 per cent of a Volvo truck can be recycled and that figure is set to increase. In a new Volvo FM or FH 4x2, for instance, a massive 97 per cent of the cast iron used in the truck consists of recycled iron.
In Volvo Trucks' two recycling plants in Sweden, not one single scrapped truck is buried in landfill.
The company also focuses on its factories' environmental footprint. The aim is that all the company's factories are to be carbon dioxide-neutral, wherever in the world they are located. The factory at Gent in Belgium was first off the mark in 2007 and the plants at Tuve and Umeå in Sweden will become carbon dioxide-neutral in 2011.
Anna Sjölin, Key Account Manager at Volvo Trucks, notes that the environment is becoming increasingly important to customers, when she says, "We have customers who contact us because they realise that we are at the cutting edge in the environmental area. Many customers feel somewhat at a loss in the debate on alternative fuels or eco-friendly technologies, and they regard Volvo as a serious and dependable business partner.".
She says that customers can use the new version of the EPD tool to verify their own environmental targets. For example, Deutsche Post DHL has the aim of globally cutting its carbon dioxide emissions by 30 per cent per ton-kilometre by 2020 compared with 2007 emission levels.
"Truck purchase is an important part of that drive since 95 per cent of the emissions we generate in Sweden comes from the trucks we use," says Ulf Hammarberg, who works with new fuels and alternative technologies at the Environmental Affairs department of DHL Freight Sweden.