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Mar 29, 2021 at 7:14 PMMore than 230 freight forwarders want to work together with DB Cargo AG to shift more trucks from the highway to the rail. The transport companies involved in Kombiverkehr KG and DB Cargo are focusing on expanding the joint network towards a true scheduled service. In addition, digitalization and automation are expected to make the handling processes significantly simpler and faster.
(Frankfurt am Main) Through better integration of freight trains and trucks, Deutsche Bahn and Kombiverkehr expect a CO2 reduction of around 50 million tons over the next ten years. In a cooperation agreement with a 9-point plan for so-called combined transport, both companies have expressed their commitment to a joint growth strategy and have defined concrete expansion steps. Existing terminal locations will be supplemented with additional ones and expanded into a “Metro Network”.
A scheduled timetable will connect important German and European economic centers even more frequently. Furthermore, the scheduling and billing of the so-called intermodal transports will be organized in a significantly more digital and less bureaucratic manner. This will make it even easier for logistics providers to switch to the climate-friendly rail for long distances. Currently, the share of intermodal transport is 36 percent in rail freight transport, according to the Federal Statistical Office. The growth potential of this mode of transport is the highest in the logistics industry. It is projected to increase by 150 percent over the next 10 years. This is because combined transport is ideally suited for globalized supply chains, as it involves not the freight itself, but standardized loading containers such as containers, semi-trailers, or swap bodies being directly transferred from the truck to a freight train. At the destination, a truck tractor brings the container the last mile to its destination.
Saving Equivalent to a Coal-Fired Power Plant
Statement from DB Freight Transport Board Member Dr. Sigrid Nikutta: “Combined transport is the ICE in our environmental network for freight trains. With intelligent network and terminal expansion, many more direct connections, and significantly easier handling for our customers, we are bringing more traffic onto the rails. The potential is enormous: We save the environment as much CO2 as if we were taking an entire coal-fired power plant off the grid every year. This way, combined transport makes a very important contribution to ensuring that we can meet European climate targets in the transport sector in the long term, even beyond the Corona crisis.”
Statement from Federal Minister of Transport Andreas Scheuer: “We want to shift more goods from the road to the environmentally friendly rail. This new cooperation between rail and road fits perfectly into our master plan for rail freight transport, with which we aim to strengthen the competitiveness and innovative capacity of the sector. Forecasts predict that freight traffic in combined transport will increase by nearly 80 percent by 2030. We expect a CO2 saving of 50 million tons from this project alone. This shows me that combined transport significantly contributes to achieving our climate goals in transport.”
Winning Road Freight Forwarders for Rail
Statement from Hermann Lanfer, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Kombiverkehr KG: “Today, road and rail, freight forwarders and DB Cargo send a strong signal: We are serious about the transport transition in freight transport. As Kombiverkehr, we bring the stakeholders to the table to jointly expand the existing collaboration and give combined transport new, decisive impulses. The needs of the customers are at the center of our efforts. Freight forwarders should be able to shift transports to the rail more easily and quickly. Because only through concrete shifting do we change the modal split and make the transport transition a reality: Specifically, we are strengthening the synergies built since 2001 with a 9-point plan for a strong and climate-friendly combined transport: We will optimize service, networking, and digitalization as best as possible, so that we can also win over the freight forwarders for the rail who have previously only used the road. In this way, we sustainably reduce the CO2 emissions of freight transport together with DB Cargo and the BMVI.”
Photos/Graphics: @ DB Cargo/Kombiverkehr
