The environmental footprint of transporting the packaging products from the manufacturing location to the warehouse (sale location) is taken into account in the transport stage. Based on the manufacturing location and the warehouse location in the Pickler tool, it is calculated what the contribution of this transport is to the environmental footprint.
Distance
The transport distance over sea is calculated by using Sea routes and distances. The transport distance over land is calculated by using Google Maps.
Volume and weight
For transport, there is a point that a freight is considered as volume transport or as weight transport. The break-even point for this is calculated as: (break-even weight/volume ratio) / (actual weight/volume ratio).
In this way, packaging that is lightweight and uses a lot of volume is taken into consideration. The tipping point varies per transport method and can be found in reference 1.
Load factors
In the calculation of the environmental footprint of transport, we consider the average 'load factors', which are on average the number of times that there is a returning freight available. The load factors (or occupancy rate) depend on the transport method. The load factors are explained in detail in reference 1.
Reference 1:
Book: ' A practical guide for students, designers and business managers' by Joost Vögtlander. Free download.
Out of scope
Please read here which data is out of scope for transportation.