Carbon and Energy Efficient Supply Chains

Consumers will soon be able to quantify the carbon footprint of products they consume, and that could begin to change consumer behavior. The common banana you buy, say organic or not, is probably labeled by the country or origin. Increasingly, you might see a second sticker adorning your beloved yellow fruit – it will be a tally of the banana’s total carbon emissions as it moved from farm to table. That single number is not a simple one. If the bananas you bought this week were transported from Indonesia by boat––they have a different carbon footprint than the bunch you consumed last month grown, say in Mexico, and moved by rail. Behind this labeling system are a complex supply chain, logistics, and transportation considerations. And behind the measurement of this network is the research of Edgar Blanco and his colleagues at MIT. He begins with a consumer perspective.