WAREHOUSING, HANDLING
he recent COP26 summit has, despite some disappointments, highlighted the need for radical change in every area of the modern economy, supply chains not least. This need is widely accepted and being acted on in transport—electric or perhaps hydrogen powered vehicles, modal shift to rail, even low carbon deep sea shipping—but the carbon impact, and potential for improvement, of essentially static and inert warehousing and storage is less considered.
That poses a problem, especially in the UK. It is well recognised that the country is ‘under-warehoused’, especially given the rapid and permanent rise in eCommerce with its demands for increasingly sophisticated distribution facilities. But continuing to build ever more ‘big sheds’ is not sustainable, let alone carbon-neutral.
The UK’s construction and building industries rate really poorly in international terms for their use of concrete, steel, and other energy-i–nsive materials – and ‘net-zero carbon’ steel or cement are still largely aspirations, rather than achievable realities. New build is intrinsically bad for any carbon footprint. There are less obvious climate change considerations. Firstly, while the local effects of climate change on agriculture are as yet unknown,
SAVE THE PLANET BY LOOKING INTO SPACE T
they are unlikely to be positive. Should we really be concreting over more farmland, in a country that has not been able to feed itself for two hundred years or more? And secondly, is it wise to build ever more distribution centres, vital nodes in the economy of the nation, on increasingly vulnerable, if attractively flat, flood plains?
The need for more warehousing and storage capacity is undeniable. Ironically, increased capacity may be essential to achieving other carbon and wider environmental goals, for example, by enabling more energy-efficient transport and distribution networks. But does all of this need to be new build? We know that there is a considerable estate of unused, or under-utilised, warehousing that is potentially available, at least on a short-term or temporary basis. We also know that there are many businesses desperate to take advantage of those opportunities. How can we bring these parties together, to improve the carbon performance of supply chains without adding to the burden of new build?
Many companies are sitting on vacant or under- utilised storage space. They may have off-shored some of their manufacturing, meaning they have a lower requirement for goods-inward storage. They
may have outsourced some of their distribution to a 3PL’s network. They may have ‘legacy’ facilities from mergers or acquisitions, or they may have moved to a strategy of national or regional DCs, leaving local stock-holding points behind. Their requirements may have shrunk due to leaner supply chains, or sometimes the actual product is now radically smaller. Their business model, perhaps a shift to B2C eCommerce rather than bulk sales to wholesalers or retailers, may have made space redundant. This ‘sort of vacant’ space is not carbon-neutral. It is not too easy to heat, or refrigerate, or otherwise service as just part of a warehouse. On the other hand, there are many firms that desperately need more warehousing storage or operational space. There are temporary, one-off, requirements: perhaps a relocation while the existing warehouse is refitted. There may be unplanned events such as a fire in the warehouse or perhaps a major product recall.
Then there are planned peak requirements. Many businesses have to build stock in anticipation of seasonal or predictable events, for example: New season fashion, Christmas, Easter, sporting tournaments, big rock tours and so on. These events may be one-off or annual, and some companies scale
46 FEBRUARY 2022 | FACTORY&HANDLINGSOLUTIONS
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