How do you calculate emissions with a low weight/volume ratio during transport?

Question

Hi Everyone,

I'm trying to find a good way to calculate emissions during transport. However, because most emission factors are in tkm I have troubles dealing with shipments that are low in weight and high in volume.
DHL calculates the volumetric weight in their carbon calculator, but those conversions are based on costs.
Is there a (standardized) method to account emissions for high volume/ low weight during transport?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

I do not know of any standards for this. However, most transportation carriers usually state their weight as well as volume limits.

I would try to obtain volumetric limits, and use this to feasibly scale the tkm-measure for the transport.

Naturally this introduces some assumptions, and needs proper sensitivity and uncertainty analyses to be conducted.

I understand why the LCI-database developers do not want to get into this though. Having solely volume as proxy for transport scenarios will similarly be increasingly non-representative for very dense products.