Efficient and reliable transportation of consignments (ERTOC)

This paper describes a new initiative to drive business improvement and sustainability throughout the supply chain from factory to point of sale. The effort, called Efficient and Reliable Transportation of Consignments (ERTOC), aims to develop a standards based open architecture data hub to deliver accurate information for transport operators and their customers to use and improve business efficiency and effectiveness. Only by understanding the true environmental costs involved, users will be able to compare and assess different transport options to make better informed choices. Such a need drives this effort to demonstrate how a standardised data hub can track the carbon costs of transport at consignment level. The paper presents the underlying architecture of the proposed system, which serves to integrate (diverse and third party) resources, involving collection of data, storage and provision of it for further processing