Autumn 2006

Buying groceries online can reduce CO2 emissions by two thirds, according to research into home grocery deliveries by retailer LeShop.ch in Switzerland. The work was carried out by Estia SA, a Lausanne-based Federal Polytechnic Institute (EPFL) spin-off specialising transport and the urban environment.

The study examined LeShop's existing arrangement with ExpressPost, a division of the country's postal service, to deliver goods to shoppers.

On average, postal vans are said to deliver 800 kg of goods to a dozen customers per trip. The report calls this "car pooling for grocery goods", and says it results in four times less distance, with energy consumption and CO2 emission reduced by a factor of three.

Each time a customer decides to buy online rather than go shopping by car, it concludes, the environment is spared 3.5 kg of CO2.

According to Christian Wanner, chief executive of LeShop.ch: "We knew intuitively that our model makes sense, but we did not expect such spectacular results." He adds: "If a customer buys once a week with LeShop, he or she spares the equivalent of 120 sq m of forest in CO2."