According to research by the telecom regulator BIPT, Bpost is by far the most eco-friendly parcel delivery service in Belgium. BIPT was commissioned to map out the environmental footprint of parcel delivery in the country.
According to the BIPT study, Bpost performs remarkably well compared to other parcel services. The reason? Bpost is investing heavily in parcel delivery using a wide range of electric vehicles, but has also succeeded in making its facilities highly energy-efficient in recent years. All of this contributes to significantly reducing the ecological footprint per parcel.
‘Last mile’
The initial report shows that usually around 290 grams of CO2 are emitted when a parcel is delivered to a home, and that the majority of those CO2 emissions are produced during the so-called ‘last mile.’
The latter is hardly surprising. Most players therefore invest in pickup points or parcel lockers, precisely to bypass those costly and environmentally unfriendly final miles.
Combined advantages
Bpost’s 176 grams of CO2 for the full chain delivery, however, is about 40% below the sector median of 291 grams. Its reported last-mile footprint of 53 grams is roughly 80% below the 269-gram median.
However, bpost does not have the highest percentage of electric vehicles. DHL Express, for example, has more. Bpost’s advantage appears to result from the combination of a relatively large electrified fleet, bicycle deliveries, renewable electricity, high parcel volumes that allow vehicles and routes to be filled efficiently, its own integrated collection, sorting and delivery network, and the ability to combine letters, newspapers and parcels in established rounds.
Bpost’s scale is also important. It handles around 30% to 40% of Belgian parcel and express volumes, considerably more than any individual rival. According to Bpost, it has 25 operational ecozones, covering 109 municipalities or postcode areas.
In those areas, mail and parcels are delivered using electric vans and bicycles. The company claims an average CO₂ reduction of 85% inside its Ecozones.
Benchmark
It would be incorrect to claim that bpost is Belgium’s greenest parcel service. The company clearly distinguishes itself and consistently ranks among the top performers.
However, every company has its own strengths: DHL leads in fleet electrification, and Bpost leads in reported CO₂ emissions per standard parcel. At the same time, Colis Privé scores strongly on several metrics and is the only operator reporting a significant share of biofuel. And there are still concerns. VUB research found that lockers are not automatically cleaner when people make a special car trip to collect their parcel.
In other words, Bpost is not ‘the greenest’ parcel service, but Belgium has produced its first operator-by-operator parcel-emissions benchmark, with Bpost emerging as the initial leader despite major methodological growing pains.
