The shipping industry has long had logistic challenges in the form of perishable goods. In recent weeks, the world’s second largest container shipping company and a popular e-commerce grocery service have both found sustainable solutions.
Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) has signed a contract to lease 2,000 cube refrigerators containers from SeaCube Containers that are 40-feet high and outfitted with Carrier Transicold’s natural refrigerant-based NaturaLINE refrigeration system. This system from NaturaLINE helps to protect the environment by using repurposed CO2, proven to be the refrigerant with the lowest global warming potential (GWP) out of all container refrigerants that are currently in use.
As typical shipping containers are made of durable steel that lasts an average of 25 years and cargo shipping often involves direct transport with few stops, the industry is already ahead of many other in terms of environmental sustainability. These upgraded SeaCube containers allow MSC to increase their levels of sustainability even more as they ship goods such as seafood, frozen commodities, perishable food, and pharmaceuticals.
“We are pleased to continue to improve our environmental performance by equipping our fleet with the latest green technologies,” says Giuseppe Prudente, Chief Logistics Officer at MSC.
When Carrier Transicold developed NaturaLINE, they improved upon previous refrigerants that had GWPs almost 4,000 times higher. By using CO2 to achieve temperatures at minus 40 Celsius, they have developed a refrigerant that does not deplete the ozone, is widely available, nonflammable, and relatively inexpensive. Carrier Transicold’s leadership in this development closely reflects the way they led the industry away from ozone-depleting refrigerants 25 years ago.
On a scale much smaller than cargo shipping, Boxed Wholesale and TemperPack Technologies have partnered to develop and test environmentally-friendly thermal packaging to keep chocolates from melting during summer months. Boxed Wholesale is an e-commerce company that sells grocery items in bulk. They and many of their competitors have had to hold orders for chocolates and other desserts that tend to melt during shipment in the summer months. For perishable food, a combination of insulated packaging and dry ice will preserve it for 24 to 48 hours during shipping. However, that packaging often comes with unnecessary waste.
To please their customers and maintain standards of sustainability, Boxed Wholesale turned to TemperPack. TemperPack’s innovative packaging does not involve any of the usual waste associated with delivering temperature-sensitive goods. Even better, the packaging allows Boxed to serve customers in zones that take up to two days to deliver to.
“As they thought through shipping chocolates in the summer, they wanted to be sure that the packaging was thoroughly tested, that it was beautiful and on-brand, and that the materials were as sustainable as possible,” says James McGoff, co-CEO of TemperPack, regarding their partnership with Boxed Wholesale.