9 March 2010 | Helen Gilbert
US retailer Home Depot has pledged to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in its domestic supply chain by 20 per cent over the next five years.
The commitment, by the world’s largest home improvement chain, comes as the firm announced it had reduced its US store energy use by 2.6 billion kilowatt hours (kWh) since 2004.
It now plans to achieve a 20 per cent reduction in kWh per square foot usage in its US stores by 2015, alongside plans to cut domestic supply chain greenhouse gas emissions from 2008 levels.
The company said this would be achieved by changing the way it operates. It currently uses predominantly supplier-to-store transportation, but will move to a centralised distribution network to save money on logistics.
The firm added that more efficient routing and scheduling will also help it achieve the supply chain target. This will mean a reduction of 200 million miles driven per year, equating to fuel savings of 25 million gallons.
Ron Jarvis, Home Depot’s vice president of environmental innovation, said: “While our accomplishments in lowering our store energy use have been significant, we will identify additional ways we can continue the reduction. In addition, the changes we are making to increase productivity in our supply chain will allow us to reduce our transportation greenhouse gas emissions substantially.”
