It's official – online shopping is better for the environment!

A new report titled Carbon Auditing the Last Mile from Heriot-Watt University’s Logistics Research Centre has said that shopping online is up to 24 times better for the environment than using a car.

Researchers found that home delivery emits on average much lower levels of CO2 than a trip to the shops by bus or car, with the usual home delivery van emitting 18g, a bus journey 1,265g and a car 4,274g.

Put in context, this equates to a shopper needing to buy 24 separate items using a car or seven by bus to match the environmental benefits of home delivery.

"Some online retailers were claiming that if you shopped online you were doing something good for the environment – but until now we lacked hard evidence," said the LRC's Professor Alan McKinnon, one of the authors of the report.

The results suggest that is true. What this shows is that if you are buying small non-food items it is better for someone to get them delivered than to go to the shops by car or bus.

While we've never made this claim (we're far too modest for that!), we're obviously pleased with the results of the study. However, it's worth clarifying that it relies on the following assumptions:

• the conventional shopping trip is for a single item

• the item is delivered successfully first time and is not returned

• the shopping trips and home deliveries are exposed to similar traffic conditions.

So please bear this in mind when you order. Only buy what you need, and make sure you're there to take the delivery. A wasted trip is, after all, a wasted trip – no matter who is doing the driving.