Decarbonation, scope 3, and CSRD How to measure and reduce your freight CO2 emissions (scope 3, CSRD)
Freight emissions are measured by multiplying transport activity (tonne-kilometers) by an emission factor for the mode used, following the GLEC Framework and the ISO 14083 standard. In practice: for each shipment, take weight x distance and apply the factor for air, road, rail or ocean. To reduce them, act on the biggest levers in order - shift modes (air to ocean, road to rail), fill the load, optimize routing, then switch to lower-carbon fuels - and only offset or inset the residual. Because air freight can emit 20 to 50 times more per tonne-kilometer than ocean, mode choice usually dominates your footprint. For a company, this sits in scope 3 and increasingly has to be reported under CSRD, which requires reliable, traceable per-shipment data.
