Decarbonizing emissions from last-mile deliveries in Chinese cities

Abstract

Rapid growth in e-commerce has intensified last-mile logistics, increasing pressures on urban sustainability due to rising delivery-related greenhouse gas emissions. However, effective mitigation has been limited by the absence of nationwide, fine-grained measurements of last-mile emissions. Here, using 14 billion orders and location data from 1.9 million couriers, we estimate last-mile delivery emissions across 365 Chinese cities. We find that order growth does not translate proportionally into emissions: an 83.5% increase in orders from 2023 to 2024 resulted in only 31.3% additional emissions. While larger cities produce higher total emissions, smaller cities show per-order emissions up to four times greater, driven primarily by lower delivery efficiency shaped by urban density. Mitigation simulations suggest that emissions could be reduced by up to 84.2%. These findings advance understanding of how e-commerce interacts with urban systems and reveal actionable pathways toward more efficient and sustainable urban logistics. While e-commerce greatly enhances convenience for urban consumers, it also contributes to rising last-mile delivery emissions. By estimating emissions across 365 Chinese cities, this study identifies pronounced city-level differences in emission intensity and reveals substantial opportunities for mitigation.