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USLGB USNYC
Transshipment cargo

Long Beach to New York freight CO2 emissions

One tonne of cargo shipped Long Beach (USLGB) to New York (USNYC) by sea emits 63 kg CO2e well-to-wake at GLEC v3.2 default factors. The same tonne by air emits 3,374.5 kg — roughly 54x the sea number.

Lane noteAll-water Panama transit US west-to-east coast — 8,400 km via the Neopanamax locks. Panama drought constrained slots through 2024-2025, pushing some sailings around Cape Horn or to rail-bridge via Los Angeles to Chicago, NY.

Per-tonne CO2e by mode

Sea freight

Container ship 3,000-8,000 TEU (Neopanamax)

63
kg CO2e
Distance
8,400 km
Factor (WTW)
7.5 g CO2e/tkm
Per shipment
1 t × 8,400 km
Factor source
GLEC v3.2 container 8,000-15,000 TEU (Post-Panamax, WTW)

Rail freight

Mixed-traction intermodal rail

128.8
kg CO2e
Distance
4,600 km
Factor (WTW)
28 g CO2e/tkm
Per shipment
1 t × 4,600 km
Factor source
GLEC v3.2 mixed-traction intermodal rail (WTW)

Air freight

Short-haul belly cargo

3,374.5
kg CO2e
Distance
3,970 km
Factor (WTW)
850 g CO2e/tkm
Per shipment
1 t × 3,970 km
Factor source
GLEC v3.2 short-haul belly cargo (WTW)

Mode comparison

On the Long Beach to New York lane, air freight emits about 54 times more CO2e per tonne than sea freight at GLEC v3.2 defaults. The gap is driven by the WTW factor difference between long-haul belly cargo (850 g CO2e/tkm) and a Container ship 3,000-8,000 TEU (Neopanamax) (7.5 g CO2e/tkm), partly offset by the shorter great-circle air routing.

Where rail is viable on this lane, it sits between sea and road — see the per-mode card above for the exact split.

Try this in the calculator

These numbers are GLEC v3.2 defaults at 1 tonne. Change weight, vessel class, or load factor in the calculator and see the per-mode CO2e update under ISO 14083:2023 data quality tiers.

Methodology references

Need primary-data emissions for Long Beach to New York?

The EcoFreight API ingests AIS, bunker delivery notes, and shipment manifests to return ISO 14083 Tier 3 primary-data numbers for the same lane. Free tier covers 1,000 calculations per month.