Green Supply Chains

The Horizon 2020 project ULaaDS aims to facilitate and accelerate the implementation of new ‘zero-emission’ solutions for urban logistics. The focus is on the logistic challenges due to the on-demand economy. ULaaDS will contribute to ‘zero-emission’ city logistics in the European Union in 2030.

In the intercluster project Re2Live VIL cooperates with Sirris, SIM, VITO, Flux50 and VUB to research how companies in Flanders can respond to the opportunities of the growing market of lithium ion batteries for electric vehicles. Recycling these batteries offers both challenges and opportunities for the Flemish industry and logistics sector.  

In the project Logigrid, spearheadclusters VIL and Flux50 will collaboratively research how Smart Microgrids can contribute to the electrification of the Flemish logistics sector and its transition to renewable energy.

In this project ‘Hydrolog’, VIL will research the opportunities of the use of hydrogen for internal means of transport. The development of a business model in which several companies will be supplied by a mutual mobile hydrogen filling station, VIL aims to facilitate the transition to cost-efficient use of hydrogen.

The standstill of assets in the logistic sector is very costly. The amount of assets and services that are not 100 % utilized during the entire day is endless. With the project ‘Sharing Logistics’, VIL is striving towards a more efficient occupancy rate of these logistic assets through building a web platform and by matching the supply to the demand.

Hospitals and health facilities have limited insight in logistic costs. Logistics is no core business for health institutions, but that doesn’t make it less important. The pressure on the budgets, strict regulations and changing medical needs of the patients make it necessary  to reorganize health logistics.  In the project ‘Zorghubs’ (Healthcare hubs) VIL is researching the possibilities of healthcare hubs, central spaces where logistic activities of multiple health care institutions are consolidated and optimized.

Companies located in city centres generate high volumes of different kinds of waste. Local authorities are imposing more and more restrictions to company vehicles in cities. Urban waste collection is thereby becoming more and more difficult. To increase efficiency, investments in technology and material are necessary. But how do companies handle this and which investments are needed? The VIL project ‘Urban Waste Collection’ is looking for answers to these questions.

The current push strategy for food packaging does not take sufficient account of the demands, needs and wishes of everyone involved in the chain. Moreover, new distribution channels (e-commerce, food delivery, omnichannel) and an increasing diversity of food products pose new challenges to food packaging. To face these challenges and utilize the opportunities to the […]

The sharing economy is undeniably on the rise and will become an important part of the economy. With the project Cambion VIL has investigated if the principle of car sharing is applicable in the logistics sector, as so called ‘fleet sharing’.

Many companies experience problems with the logistics and processing of polluted packages, like barrels that have contained chemicals, paint, adhesives, detergents and oils. With the project Polluted Packaging Logistics VIL will research if these packages can be collected and processed more efficiently and if they could even be recycled or reused.

The use of glass bottles for beverages remains popular in Belgium. The costs of sorting out, transporting and storing these empty bottles is not to be neglected and often not very transparent. In this project VIL aims to analyse and reduce these non-value adding costs.