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58A THE JOURNAL OF COMMERCE www.joc.com SEPTEMBER 21.2015 SPECIAL REPORT GLOBAL LOGISTICS FOCUS 2015 NRS Electrifies Drayage for IKEA NATIONAL RETAIL SYSTEMS, a North Bergen, New Jersey-based third-party logistics provider, is turning from the fuel pump to the electric plug, deploying a battery- powered drayage truck in Los Angeles for customer IKEA. "We're going to start by taking containers from the port to our facility in L.A., about 12 miles away, and we'll take empties back to the port," NRS Marketing Director Chris Saville said. "Eventually, we'll be hauling containers from our yard to their stores." The elec - tric truck is part of a test that could lead to expanded use of such vehicles by NRS for its shipper customer. The truck will have a 100-mile range. The truck will be among the cleanest vehicles at a port known for pioneering clean-trucks technolog y. (In addition to clean diesel trucks, natural gas trucks operate regularly in the harbor, and some trucking companies are test- ing other technologies.) After reviewing other fuels, IKEA and NRS decided the electric option "was best," Saville said. The retail cost of diesel fuel in the U.S. is 30 percent lower than at this time last year, but overall carbon-reduction goals in corporate sustainability plans are keeping alternative vehicle fuels on the table. U.S. brewer Anheuser-Busch recently changed to compressed natural gas-fueled trucks in St. Louis and Houston, and energy com- panies are still building out CNG and liquef ied natural gas distribution net- works. The NRS truck is one element of an aggressive sustainability campaign at Swedish-based IKEA, which as the 11th- largest U.S. importer of containerized goods brought 132,700 20-foot-equivalent containers to the U.S. last year. By August 2016, IKEA hopes to reduce carbon emis- sions from transportation by 20 percent compared to fiscal 2011. In 2014, IKEA reduced transportation-related carbon emissions by 12.8 percent from 2011 lev - els, compared with 10.8 percent in 2013 and 7.3 percent in 2012, the company said in its sustainability report. In some parts of the world, deliveries are made to stores using trucks powered by biogas and other alternative fuels, including CNG and LNG. At a higher level, the retailer is creating new distribution and supplier networks to more efficiently deliver goods to its distribution centers and stores and to cus- tomers. That means upgrading technology to ensure consistently efficient transporta- tion services, including home delivery to customers, the company said. IKEA also is fitting more goods into containers. UTi, Kerry Logistics Downgrade Outlook LOGISTICS PROVIDER UTI Worldwide low- ered its earnings forecast for its current fiscal year as the company reported deeper second-quarter losses caused by declining ocean and air freight volume. CEO Edward G. Feitzinger said the normal second-quar- ter forwarding growth of about 5 percent in