Collapsible shipping container
FLAT PACK
Mar 4th 2010, The Economist
Transport: A collapsible shipping container could help reduce the
environmental impact of transporting goods
OVERHAULING an industry of which you know little is not easy, but
neither is it impossible. In 1956 Malcolm McLean, a trucker from North
Carolina, launched the first "intermodal" shipping container, which
could be transferred easily between lorries, trains and ships. It
revolutionised the transport of goods by abolishing the traditional
(and back-breaking) system of "break bulk" loading, and thus helped oil
the wheels of globalisation. Now another outsider to the shipping
industry is trying to get a similar change under way.
Rene Giesbers, a heating-systems engineer from the Netherlands, has
invented a collapsible plastic shipping container which, he hopes, will
replace McLean's steel design. Because it is made of a fibreglass
composite, it weighs only three-quarters as much as a standard
container but--more importantly-- when empty, it can be folded down to
a quarter of its size. The composite is more resistant to corrosion
than the steel it replaces, is easier to clean and floats. It is also
greener to manufacture. Making one of the new containers produces 25%
of the carbon dioxide that would be generated by the manufacture of its
steel counterpart.
A collapsible shipping container would be useful for several reasons.
Patterns of trade mean that more goods travel from China to America,
for example, than the other way around, so ships, trains and lorries
inevitably carry some empty containers. If these were folded, there
would be more room for full containers and some vessels would be
liberated to ply different routes. If collapsed containers were bundled
together in groups of four, ships could be loaded more quickly, cutting
the time spent in ports. They would also take up less space on land,
allowing depots to operate more efficiently.
Mr Giesbers is not the first to invent a collapsible container. Several
models were experimented with in the early 1990s but failed to catch
on, mainly because of the extra work involved in folding and unfolding
them. There were also concerns about their strength. Mr Giesbers says
the Cargoshell, as he has dubbed his version, can be collapsed or
opened in 30 seconds by a single person using a forklift truck. It is
now undergoing tests to see if it is strong enough to meet
international standards.
There are currently about 26m containers in the world, and the volume
of goods they carry has risen from 13.5m "twenty-foot equivalent units"
in 1980 to almost 140m today. It is expected to reach 180m by 2015. Mr
Giesbers aims to have 1m Cargoshells plying the seas, rails and roads
by 2020, equivalent to 4% of the market.
Bart Kuipers, a harbour economist at Erasmus University in Rotterdam,
thinks that is a little ambitious, but he reckons the crate could win
2-3% of the market. He thinks it is the container's lower weight,
rather than its collapsibility, that makes it attractive. It will
appeal to firms worried about their carbon footprints--and if oil
prices rise, that appeal will widen.
Ultimately, the main obstacle to the introduction of the Cargoshell may
be institutional rather than technical. As Edgar Blanco, a logistics
expert at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, points out,
"Everyone is vested in the current system. Introducing a disruptive
technology requires a major player to take a huge risk in adopting it.
So the question will always boil down to: who pays for the extra cost,
and takes the initial risk?"
Comments
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@ 27.07.2010 15:25 CETIn my opinion this is really great idea to implement in use such type of containers. The meaning of this is improbably high, as it will help to save the nature!
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@ 01.08.2010 23:09 CETThis containers are truly great to use, aside from from humans can benefit from it, it is also an advantage from our mother nature. Thanks for this information.
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@ 16.08.2010 06:45 CETFor me, It is nice if it will be implemented ASAP. This is a very good project.
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@ 18.08.2010 02:43 CETThanks for this very informative article. Keep on posting.
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@ 19.08.2010 11:39 CETOn a fiscal basis the government should step in here as in the long term this will aid them in reducing the impact of climate change which in turn will help them meet one of there key targets. With oil prices rising more and more and the container being light weight firms will be fools not to even consider this option in there forthcoming budgeting agendas. It's a shame that so much money has been vested in the present system and change management would mean more money, maybe if the R & D team of firms joined up collaboratively the costs will go down as well.
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@ 03.09.2010 04:57 CETI think these containers should be used more then they are. I never new they had these containers. We have to get away from burning so much gas.
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@ 28.10.2010 20:26 CETWhile traditional containers can carry a lot of cargo, when the containers are empty, which occupy a large amount of space that is not used. On the other hand, the volume of a folding container Cargoshell is a quarter the size of a steel container, reducing the space to 75 percent. Considered the "concept of packaging the 21 st century," it takes a person less than 30 seconds to open and close the container.
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