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45 comments on What you can do about Peak Oil and Petrol Prices
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45 comments on What you can do about Peak Oil and Petrol Prices
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Actually we do still have steam trains (saw one pull in to my station the other day). Building new steam powered locomotives is going to be easier and cheaper than trying to electrify distant inter city rail lines, although highly unlikely. I think that CNG running a gas turbines is much more likely for a large train than it is for a car.
Termoil
I not sure where you get this information from.
From an engineering perspective electrified rail has a lot of advantages over steam locomotives or in fact CNG power for this application:
- the technology currently exists
- the efficiency in power generation will be considerably higher for a centralised power station compared to small local power generation.
- electrified rail provides a seamless transition into transport that is fully powered by renewables.
- electrification provides for regenerative braking which is difficult for a stand alone locomotive.
Europe has an entire network of electrified rail. I appreciate the issues associated with population density but it is not unreasonable that in australia we at least have electrification on the main trafic routes between capital cities.
Phoenix,
I was simply pointing out that we do still have older technolgy which is still running today that can run directly on coal and wood. Trains really are one of the most versatile forms of land transport when it comes to diversification of fuel and electricity is proabably the top of the pile. But electrification needs density and regular services to make both the installation and maintenance of it worthwhile.
I have spoken with Tim Fischer about electrification and it just doesn't make sense at the moment until we have a thoroughly thought out integrated rail freight management plan. Tims focus is on achieveing the 15 key hubs that we need in Australia to distribute freight and first get the tracks up to standard.
Just by re-aligning the track betweeen Sydney and Melbourne you can shave a whopping 100Km off the current distance but it will cost an enormous amount of money. Throw electrification on top and you are looking at potentially a multi billion dollar project just for one line that may have at best half a dozen freight trains a day on it.
My point is that there are other options than just large scale expensive projects where the cost/benefit analysis would, I am guessing, be questionable. A gas turbine CNG fueled Hybrid locomotive with a pantograph attached for when it does get into a city would blow the doors of full electrification on a whole range of measures and would be far more doable in your five year timeframe.