EDEN PRAIRIE, MINN. — C.H. Robinson has announced several initiatives that aim to reduce the carbon footprint of industry partners:

• Emissions IQ - a free, self-serve tool to instantly show a company’s carbon emissions across all forms of transportation globally.
• A collaboration with MIT and the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that gives companies a standardized way to measure the emissions of their partial truckloads for the first time.
• Data for companies to benchmark their carbon output against their industry and other shippers.

In its pilot phase, Emissions IQ helped 125 companies reduce their carbon emissions by a total of 350,000 metric tons of CO2 equivalent, which is equal to what 39 million gallons of gasoline would put out.  

“You can only change what you can measure,” said Angie Freeman, C.H. Robinson’s chief sustainability officer. “Even companies committed to sustainability have struggled to capture their emissions across complex, multi-faceted supply chains. By putting useful technology and data at their fingertips, we’re not only increasing the transparency of emissions in our industry, but we’re surfacing the best strategies for customers to make meaningful carbon reductions right now.”

Emissions IQ, the latest innovation from C.H. Robinson’s tech incubator Robinson Labs, automatically calculates emissions and provides an easy visualization of a shipper’s carbon output. Data on all transportation modes is available from C.H. Robinson now, with all in the self-serve tool once ocean and air are added later this year. Accredited to use the Global Logistics Emissions Counsel (GLEC) framework, Emissions IQ provides data that can be trusted and universally accepted.

C.H. Robinson’s partnership with MIT’s Center for Transportation & Logistics and the EPA’s SmartWay program establishes a national standard for measuring less-than-a-truckload (LTL) shipments – which have skyrocketed because of the e-commerce boom. Accounting for the extra miles and higher fuel consumption of a truck making multiple pickups and deliveries, C.H. Robinson is sharing this advanced data model with the EPA to incorporate into its online tools. Any company will be able to instantly get a calculation of its LTL emissions.

C.H. Robinson is also giving companies a way to benchmark against others and track their progress over time. With a worldwide network of nearly 200,000 customers and carriers, C.H. Robinson offers the largest set of emissions benchmarking data in the industry, according to the company. That information combined with C.H. Robinson’s expert global sustainability consultants, gives any company the building blocks for creating more sustainable supply chains.

“We’ve helped companies improve how they transport their goods for decades – constantly looking to reduce waste and improve performance in the supply chain,” said Freeman. “A more efficient supply chain is by nature a more sustainable one. As one of the world’s largest logistics platforms and the largest mover of truckload freight in the world, we’re in a position to create real impact on emissions now and in the future for our customers, our industry and our planet.”