Transport

The issue

The movement of goods from manufacturer to warehousing to retail shops generates carbon dioxide, a direct contributor to climate change. National and local governments, communities and individuals are all beginning to address the challenge of climate change by altering the way they do things to reduce their "carbon footprint." Business also has a role to play, including the retail sector, and we continue to take an active part in reducing our impact within our supply chain distribution systems.

What we're doing

We're committed to reducing the amount of carbon dioxide produced from transport operations relating to our business. For many years we've been planning the deliveries to our shops to reduce the kilometres travelled, to reduce the fuel used and to increase the amount of product we carry per load. More details can be found in the position statements section on this page.

Transporting goods to our shops and customers

The vehicles transporting goods from our automated central distribution centre to our stores are managed in partnership with a third party logistics provider and in 2010/11 these vehicles travelled 37.4 million kilometres and produced around 33,500 tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO₂), a reduction of 1.8 million kilometres and around 200 tonnes of CO₂. Our small van fleet which takes prescription medicines to care homes produced around 4,800 tonnes of CO₂ in 2011/12.

Current initiatives

During 2010/11 we've further reduced the like for like carbon dioxide emissions from our trunking and store delivery fleet through a series of inititiatives, including the continued use of new vehicle types for our store delivery and trunking fleet. Examples include:

A unique vehicle and award winner

During the last quarter of 2008/09, the Boots UK logistics team started design work on an innovative store delivery vehicle which aimed to reduce the number of kilometres travelled when delivering goods to our Boots UK stores. The new vehicle design, a 10 metre long by 4.1 metre high 'Multi-deck Urban Delivery' (MUD) trailer, delivers around 50% more wheeled containers compared to a standard 10 metre store delivery trailer. This additional capacity, within the same overall length, allows the combining of delivery routes which would have previously been made by two 10 metre rigid vehicles.

In 2009/10 we assessed the operational effectiveness of the new vehicle from our Basingstoke Cross Dock Centre. The vehicle went on to win the innovation award at the BitC East Midlands carbon positive awards in 2010.

This year we have also rolled out our 'Multi-deck Urban Delivery' (MUD) trailer concept and now have a fleet of 11 vehicles which will generate an estimated annual saving of nearly half a million kilometres and approximately 350 tonnes of CO₂.

Double-deck trailer fleet

During 2010/11 we were operating with 227 of these trailers on our delivery routes from our automated central distribution centre in Nottingham to our regional Cross Dock Centres. Forty five of these double deck vehicles are curtain sided to support backloading from suppliers who do not have the capability to load double decks from loading bays.

Our double deck trailers enable us to make two journeys rather than the three we would have made using our standard vehicles.

Wagon and drag

We continue to use 12 "Wagon and Drag" vehicles, made up of a rigid vehicle and a box trailer. This allows us to move more products per journey than when using a standard store delivery vehicle, while also enabling us to deliver to our shops with limited delivery access.

Backloading

We're also continuing our policy of backloading - using vehicles to deliver products to stores, and then to collect bulk products destined for our warehouse from our suppliers on the return journey. We still manage directly the scheduling of our backloading operations, with our efforts now saving the equivalent of around 2.4 million kilometres of travel on UK roads (around 1,800 tonnes of CO₂) each year. Over the last few years we have seen a slight reduction in kilometres, due to the expansion of our double deck fleet. More details can be found in the further information section on this page.

Reducing carbon dioxide emissions in Scotland

We've continued our collaboration with JBT Distribution Ltd, a leading local road haulage services company based in the north of Scotland. More details can be found in the further information section on this page.