Ocean Network Express and ERS Railways Reduce CO2 Emissions

<29th September 2022, London> Striving to contribute to a CO2 neutral value-chain, Ocean Network Express (ONE) is actively procuring environmentally friendly transport solutions suitable for their European and African inland services network.

The Singaporean headquartered shipping line consciously considers the environmental impact of all aspects of their service activities, including their scope 3 value chain upstream emissions and values working with eco-conscious inland transportation partners.

Long term partner ERS Railways GmbH (ERS), provides rail services from Hamburg, Bremerhaven and Rotterdam and shares ONE’s environmental ambition. The company is committed to avoiding unnecessary emissions, reducing existing emissions and compensating unavoidable emissions.

ERS exclusively operates ultra-modern Vectron locomotives that run on clean TüStrom Bahn Natur green energy sourced from Norwegian hydropower. Equipped with intelligent driver assistance and advanced braking systems which allow energy recovery, the trains are currently amongst the most energy-efficient locomotives on the market. The TÜV-certified Norwegian hydropower is particularly environmentally friendly as its production generates neither CO2 nor radioactive waste.

Jan van Dijk, Senior Environmental Specialist at ONE’s Rotterdam based inland procurement team, emphasizes ONE’s environmental aspirations saying, “Initiatives like operating Vectron trains running on green energy fit into ONE’s environmental ambition to be a leading green business partner. It contributes to achieving our environmental goals as set out in our ISO14001 certified environmental management system for our landside operations. Electric trains are generally considered to be one of the most eco-friendly means of transport, but by buying hydropower-based energy, ERS contributes to reducing emission figures even further”.

ERS recently implemented an emission calculator in accordance with the EN16258 standard. According to this calculation method, ONE has saved 175,000 kilograms of CO2 by using ERSs’ rail services during its 2021 business cycle.

Tjeerd Spierdijk, ERS’s Senior Sales Manager for Benelux and Germany said, “ERS takes environmental responsibility by proactively enhancing and emphasizing the green aspect of our services. We foresee that transportation services in future, as part of the supply chain, will be measured against CO2 and we are glad that partners like ONE are already procuring their landside operations taking the environmental performance of their suppliers in mind.” He also said: “CO2 emission calculations are a complex activity if you want to do it right. ERS strives to provide our customers emission reporting of their individual booked containers which is as close as possible to the actual emission. Our CO2 calculator differs from the existing market standards as ERS takes it one step further by calculating the individual transport energy consumption per loaded unit on a specific rail shuttle, taking into consideration variables such as payload and actual train utilization”.

ONE is also working on visualising their scope 3 emission figures, similar to ERS’s method, by incorporating calculation logic into their inland transportation planning software. The algorithm allows for calculation based on a variety of variables like mode of transport, container condition, cargo weight and actual travelled distances.