Flock Freight’s business model is built on sustainability and reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the freight industry. The company announced Tuesday that it will offset 100% of carbon emissions for FlockDirect customers for free in 2021 to achieve carbon neutrality.
“We are the only company in the world that uses technology to fundamentally change the way freight moves,” Oren Zaslansky, founder and CEO, said in an interview with FreightWaves.
While many companies use technology to improve efficiencies in different areas of the supply chain, Solana Beach, California-based Flock Freight can “Tetris out a truck” to strategically build shared truckloads using technology, Zaslansky said.
Flock Freight has been planning to include carbon offsetting as part of its sustainability strategy, Zaslansky said. “We’ve been working on it for a long time. This was also a very exhaustive process.”
The company partnered with Carbonfund.org to calculate the emissions saved when moving freight via shared truckload compared to standard less-than-truckload shipments. Zaslansky said the majority of the carbon offsets will be earned through the unique business model that Flock Freight uses to build shared truckloads and quantifiably reduce GHG emissions.
“We are excited to partner with Flock Freight in the effort to eliminate carbon emissions in the
trucking industry, which is generally a big contributor to global carbon emissions,” said Eric M.
Carlson, president of Carbonfund.org, in a release.
Flock Freight’s shared truckload solution eliminates GHG emissions by up to 40% and is “hubless,” bypassing terminals, Zaslansky said.
After calculations, if there are remaining emissions to be accounted for, the company will purchase carbon credits, according to Flock Freight.
Zaslansky told FreightWaves that some freight companies are offering customers the option to purchase carbon offsets from them, but that can actually be an opportunity for companies to monetize it. A regular trucking company could hypothetically sell its customers carbon offsets without actually changing its operations to be more sustainable, he said.
What’s different about Flock Freight’s carbon offsetting strategy is that FlockDirect users are provided with carbon offsets for free through its innovative truck-sharing technology.
FlockDirect accounts for a significant majority of the transactions that Flock Freight sells, according to Zaslansky. He recognized that companies sometimes make sustainability claims that don’t impact a very large portion of their business. Zaslansky said Flock Freight was built on environmental and social sustainability principles and aims to make the world a better place.
FlockDirect freight is loaded on shared trucks and won’t be touched until it gets to its destination, Zaslansky said. This way of shipping ensures that every truck is full and avoids congestion and wasted time loading and unloading at terminals, drastically reducing emissions, he added. In 2020, Flock Freight reduced carbon emissions by 4,127 metric tons, according to a release.
This move to offset carbon emissions follows the rigorous process Flock Freight went through to become a Certified B Corporation.
“About a year ago, we became the only Certified B Corporation in freight,” Zaslansky said. He said it was difficult to meet the standards, and Flock Freight was rejected multiple times before being accepted.
He added that there are several “green” certifications and badges that companies get, but the website said that Certified B Corporations have a legal responsibility to meet the “highest standards of social and environmental impact.” To get B-certified, companies have to score at least 80 out of 200 points on the B Impact Assessment, satisfy legal requirements and publicly share their B Impact Report for transparency.
Zaslansky said that sustainability is part of Flock Freight’s DNA, and the company will continue to strive to reduce emissions through increased efficiencies as the company grows.
Click here for more FreightWaves articles by Alyssa Sporrer.
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