According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, freight transportation is a major contributor to air pollution, accounting for more than 50 percent of nitrogen oxide emissions, over 30 percent of volatile organic compound emissions, and over 20 percent of particulate matter emissions. Projections indicate that growth in air emissions from freight will exceed growth in emissions from all other transportation activities—including passenger transportation—by 2025. More broadly, McKinsey estimates that 90 percent of companies’ impacts on the environment come from supply chains, and data from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations indicates supply chains cause 40 percent of all food waste in North America.

“The supply chain is a huge contributor to environmental pollution, waste and inefficiency, but companies now have an opportunity to change that,” said FourKites CEO Mathew Elenjickal. “Our new Sustainability Dashboard—fueled by real-time logistics data from the FourKites platform—is a powerful solution that will help our network achieve their sustainability objectives while simultaneously reducing operating costs and gaining additional business efficiencies.”

FourKites’ Sustainability Dashboard provides customers with insight into:

• Estimated greenhouse gas emissions from freight activity
• Modes of transportation - rail, ocean, truck - that are contributing the most and least to emissions, at an aggregate level and on a per-shipment basis
• How emission levels and patterns are changing over time
• Which lanes have the highest and lowest emissions

“FourKites’ new Sustainability Dashboard is an important new addition to our supply chain visibility toolkit,” said Dustin Braun, senior director, logistics at Land O’Lakes, Inc., a longtime FourKites customer. “Implementing sustainable practices is one of Land O’Lakes’ top priorities. By leveraging the Sustainability Dashboard, we are able to assess and validate our sustainability efforts on an ongoing basis. Combined with other FourKites visibility tools such as Lane Connect and Network Visibility, we are gaining fantastic insight into our supply chain.”

As part of the company’s commitment to making a positive impact on this global issue, FourKites introduced a new Sustainability Center of Excellence (SCoE), that kicked off last month with the company’s virtual summit, “The Future of Supply Chain Sustainability.” The event, which saw over 1,000 attendees, featured discussions with nine supply chain leaders—including Coca-Cola North America, Henkel and the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals—who shared their visions for how businesses can optimize operations to support their sustainability initiatives. The SCoE will offer an ongoing series of webinars, best practices content and collaboration opportunities for the logistics community, as well as opportunities for members to beta test and collaborate on future products. With over 20 members to date, SCoE participants include Alexis Bateman, director at the MIT Center for Transportation & Logistics; Michael Torrance, chief sustainability officer at BMO Financial Group; Dustin Braun, senior director, logistics at Land O’Lakes; Philipp Kolb, international supply chain sustainability, at Henkel; Meghan Stasz, vice president, packaging & sustainability at Consumer Brands Association; and Rob Haddock, group director planning & logistics at The Coca-Cola Company.