Grocery Delivery Lowers Carbon Dioxide Emissions Over Individual Trips 417
vinces99 writes "Those trips to the store can take a chunk out of your day and put more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. But now University of Washington engineers have found that using a grocery delivery service can cut carbon dioxide emissions by at least half when compared with individual household trips to the store. Trucks filled to capacity that deliver to customers clustered in neighborhoods produced the most savings in carbon dioxide emissions, but there are even benefits with delivery to rural areas."
Only true for a small portion of the world (Score:5, Insightful)
When I go to the grocery, I walk there. I doubt that any delivery service can be more efficient. However, to be able to shop in that way, the supermarket must be not more than 10-20 min away from home (by foot or by bike).
so I can't choose my own food? (Score:5, Insightful)
I want the milk that is newest, the meat without marbling, the pear without bruises, and the beets without rotting leaves.
I'm sure it benefits the store to provide me whatever is oldest and/or least desired. If I don't buy more food to compensate, throwing out half of it, there may even be an environmental benefit. (less food waste if people eat the moldy food) No thanks. I want the good stuff.
Re:Particular diet. (Score:2, Insightful)
In other news, when everyone in a neighbourhood packs into a bus, which delivers them to work and returns them home in the evening, the result will be a reduction in carbon dioxide into the atmosphere vs everyone driving themselves.
News at 11.
At produce returns may have some impact both profits and carbon dioxide...
WebVan, Safeway, substitution, and allergens (Score:5, Insightful)
Congratulations, now go make^H^H^H^Hlose a billion $$$!
Safeway is starting to offer this as a service; however, like WebVan, they reserve the right to substitute "equivalent" goods when they feel it's necessary.
When WebVan did that, we ended up with something with peanut oil in it instead of canola oil, which it's lucky we caught, or someone could have died.
When Safeway does it, it's going to be replacing name brands with Safeway brands, and it is more or less *always* be necessary, since they are sending the vans from the distribution center, which only stocks a few name brands. Toilet tissue? You get Safeway. Kleenex? You get Safeway tissue.
The asinine thing is that Safeway *already* does not use the frequency marketing card data to datamine it and say to themselves "Hmmmm... this card never buys anything containing peanuts, and hasn't for 10 years; let's flag them so that if they accidentally get something that has peanuts in it, they get an 'are you sure?' at the checkout". This despite the databases they already have on product ingredients and everything the card has *ever* been used to buy make this type of mining *trivial*.
Instead, the assholes print out $0.50 off coupons for exactly the products that we've been avoiding for 10 years, every time we buy an "equivalent" non-store brand version of the item. Of course it's cleverly based on the fact that on our next trip we are likely to be picking up one of the "equivalent" products that don't contain what amounts to rat poison, or might as well, for the allergic person.
Seriously, this is a stupid idea.
Re:so I can't choose my own food? (Score:5, Insightful)
In my experience, the grocery delivery services know that you're going to be super-suspicious about low-quality food, and make a point of giving you the best stuff. They advertise this heavily, and from what I've seen it's true. (Their financial incentive to give you crap food is smaller than their financial incentive to operate fewer expensive retail stores.)
Also, keep in mind that if they're delivering from a central warehouse rather than a retail location, the food won't have been sitting out shriveling on a display shelf for three days before you buy it.
Re:Only true for a small portion of the world (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Only true for a small portion of the world (Score:4, Insightful)
What is this "European" system of which you speak?
He started it. The Polish author I'm replying to described how things worked "outside the US". That seemed pretty broad to me, so I narrowed it down to just Europe, based on my personal experience seeing corner shops in the UK, France, Switzerland, Italy, and Austria.
I'm the first to admit that some Americans generalize too broadly about the rest of the world, but this conversation started off with a Polish guy implying that corner shops are used worldwide, followed by a Briton (I checked) saying that because I'm American I'm clueless about European multiculturalism -- and *I'm* the one being called out for hasty generalization?
Re:Particular diet. (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd not trust them to pick the best they could find of the veggies, or the most well marbled pieces of beef...I'd expect the store would pick according to its own best interest, which would be rotating all oldest food out first.
When I go shopping, I like to touch the veggies, I want to feel if an avocado is nearly ripe or past its prime or hard as a rock.
You know, I'm just not THAT worried about being a little greener, when it comes at the cost of my getting the best food I can for my money.Besides, I usually do all my shopping on ONE day. I find the sale ads in my city, and hit about 2-3 stores to get the best deals on what's on sale that week....and come home to cook for the week.
What store is going to do THAT for me? With my one weekly trip, how much carbon could I possibly be using?