Walmart Canada Goes Carbon-Neutral For Last Mile Delivery

Shoppers are increasingly aligning their purchasing decisions with progressive values, and minimizing the environmental impact of delivery has been top of mind for many as ecommerce options proliferate and consumer spending increasingly shifts toward online delivery. To lead on the sustainability front, it is important for retailers to provide zero impact delivery options, both through carbon offsetting options and alternative modes of transport. Combined with the environmental impacts of packaging waste and transportation, shipping and logistics are poised to become a major battleground for differentiating customer experience

As an industry leader and to take the charge within this impact-focused landscape, Walmart is tapping sustainable tech firm EcoCart to calculate carbon emissions created from the retailer’s online orders as they are sold, shipped, and delivered. EcoCart’s novel solution allows retailers to measure their emissions and environmental cost of doing business, and then purchase an exact amount of carbon-offset credits necessary to negate those emissions created. EcoCart will independently validate and calculate Walmart Canada’s e-commerce platform’s emissions, along with sourcing and vetting high-quality projects to fund with the purchased offsets. 

Walmart Canada will support a robust portfolio of Canadian-based green initiatives that protect forests, enable composting and waste diversion, aid with refrigerant management, turn biomass into fuel, and work proactively and productively toward other impactful sustainability goals. Walmart as a company is committed to achieving Zero Emissions globally without the use of offsets by 2040, and EcoCart will provide the Canadian arm of the global retailer with quarterly impact and emissions reporting, allowing Walmart Canada to track and set benchmarks for its own third-party carrier partners as well. 

In just its first year, last-mile initiative is projected to offset an estimated 25,000 tons of emissions, the equivalent of planting around a million trees or taking 5,000 cars off the road. In addition to the last-mile project, Walmart Canada is transitioning its entire delivery fleet to alternative fuel-powered vehicles by 2028, and has also made one of the largest reservations of Tesla’s electric vehicle semi trucks in all of Canada. 

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This article originally appeared in the PSFK iQ report, Retailing For Profit & Purpose.