Sustainable Logistics Management and Environmental Cost Analysis in Waste Transportation
Abstract
Background. Transport operations are associated with a high risk of increasing carbon footprints. When implementing circular economy principles, all aspects of environmental impact are important, including the pressure on nature caused by ensuring resource circulation. Improving the efficiency of transport management, including waste transportation, can significantly reduce carbon footprints. Purpose. This study aims to analyse the relationship between the volume of waste requiring transportation, the carbon dioxide emissions generated during transportation, the costs of environmental protection and the number of permanent residents. Findings. Implementing circular economy principles requires a more thorough approach to organising the transportation of all production processes, including waste, to primary processing and disposal sites, where reuse is not possible. Economically, creating optimal conditions for implementing circular economy principles is reflected in the level of funding for environmental protection measures; for European countries, this is expressed as a percentage of GDP (average figures in recent years range from 0.2% to 0.866%). Ukraine’s environmental protection expenditures are volatile, peaking in 2014. A study was conducted in Ukraine to examine the impact of environmental expenditure on atmospheric emissions. According to the econometric analysis, a 1% increase in environmental protection expenditure leads to a 1.11% increase in the carbon footprint (p < 0.01), indicating the need for a significant revision of waste logistics approaches. The Durbin–Watson statistic is 1.792, which falls within the acceptable range of 1.5–2.5, indicating no significant first-order autocorrelation in the residuals. Implications. When implementing circular economy principles, it is necessary to analyse all aspects of economic activity from an environmental perspective. Transportation is a high-risk area, requiring a review of both the technical and technological aspects of waste transportation operations, as well as changes to the institutional framework governing circular economy implementation principles.