Professor Philip Greening

Director of The Centre for Sustainable Road Freight and the Centre for Logistics and Sustainability

Professor Greening is the Director of two research centres: The Centre for Sustainable Road Freight and the Centre for Logistics and Sustainability. These two research centres define Professor Greening’s research focus. 

The environmental imperative coupled with increased connectivity, and the proliferation of data combine to create the circumstances for radical change. This is necessary if we are to meet the climate change challenge of net zero emissions by 2050.

Transport accounts for approximately one third of all CO2 emissions and is particularly difficult to decarbonize. 

Professor Greenings work spans many research approaches (including corporate case studies, roadmap development, and traditional logistics modelling), but his greatest interest is in the development of large-scale high fidelity, self-organising models, more commonly recognized as digital twins, or virtual worlds, which facilitate the exploration of disruptive innovation impact.

Current research has focused on the energy and operational impact of the electrification of logistics, using large scale virtual models of four major cities across Europe. These self-organizing models are being used to explore the policy-technology space to develop robust system design. Ultimately it is planned to use the same models to develop resilient systems

Areas of interest

• Agent based modelling, self-organization, sustainability, logistics, supply chain, operational research, climate change, environment, energy

Qualifications

2004-2006 MSc Supply Chain Management, Cranfield University 

2008-2014 PhD, Cranfield University

Background

Professor Greening has enjoyed a successful career in industry, starting as a Research Engineer at British Aerospace, developing novel materials. He then transitioned into digital signal processing and worked on some of the first voice activated picking systems for warehouses, before turning his hand to consultancy. As a Consultant he delivered over 30 logistics or supply chain projects across Europe.

In 2006 he started a Masters course in Supply Chain Management at Cranfield University, and continued to complete his PhD there after becoming a full time research assistant in the complex systems group

In 2013 Professor greening joined Heriot watt University as the research manager for the newly formed Centre for sustainable road freight and became its principal investigator 2 years later.

Recent publications

View all publications on Research Portal

Projects/Research showcase

Awards

Research grants

• EPSRC(EP/R035202/1): Centre for sustainable road freight 2018-2023, £2.5M
• EPSRC EP/S032061/1: Decarbonising UK’s freight logistics £60k
• InnovateUK: Vehicle to Grid feasibility study (£20K)
• InnovateUK: Up featured trailers feasibility study £60K
• InnovateUK: Wireless charging feasibility study £60K
• InnovateUK: Wireless Charging in Micro-Fulfilment Centres for Last Mile Delivery, innovate UK £1M