Diesels Under the Wires

[kermit]

With increasingly dire warnings about climate change ringing in our ears, I am quite often bemused to see diesel trains making journeys that are, from beginning to end, "under the wires". Voyagers from Euston to Glasgow for instance.

Should the TOCs be fined for such profligacy?

 

[colchesterken]

I agree I was disapointed booked a trip to York on Trainline.com, got an east coast HST going up and a Grand Central comming back, I wanted a ride on a MK4 set seemed a waste of all that money in the knitting

 

[CallySleeper]

No, because they're essentially being directed to by the Government.

The TOC runs the services specified to them with the stock given to them.

The purpose of hybrid diesel/electric trains in the future are for the purposes of the likes of East Coast's Hull or Aberdeen/Inverness services which run majorly under wires, but require diesel traction for a short part of the journey.

 

[Minilad]

Doesn't electricity generation contribute to global warming too?










Thats if you agree about climate change being man made of course







Opens can of worms

 

[edwin_m]

Even with a diesel the emissions per seat are less than driving and a lot less than flying.

 

[TheKnightWho]

Doesn't electricity generation contribute to global warming too?










Thats if you agree about climate change being man made of course







Opens can of worms

Even if coal-fired/gas power stations were of comparable efficiency to a diesel loco (they're not - they're better), then you're forgetting all that electricity produced by non-polluting sources, such as nuclear and renewables.

 

[OuterDistant]

It's still annoying that thousands of gallons of diesel are being burned unnecessarily each day.

 

[SS4]

Doesn't electricity generation contribute to global warming too?










Thats if you agree about climate change being man made of course







Opens can of worms

If I recall correctly a power plant is more efficient than a combustion engine. Plus an electric unit doesn't have to haul the weight of its fuel with it

 

[Class 170101]

then you're forgetting all that electricity produced by non-polluting sources, such as nuclear and renewables.

Not entirely sure I would want a nuclear plant on my door step regardless of its green credentials.

 

[Minilad]

I wasn't suggesting for one minute electricity generation and diesel engines polluted equally. Just that they both pollute

 

[TheKnightWho]

Not entirely sure I would want a nuclear plant on my door step regardless of its green credentials.

I'm not sure that was quite the point, though.

Plus, for the moment, they're our only viable source of going green. But that's opening a can of worms...

 

[Muzer]

Of course, more needs to be invested in nuclear fusion research which is pretty much the best thing .

 

[kermit]

Thanks for the quick responses, though I must say I hadn't intended to prompt a debate about Fusion vs Fission!

My proposal is, I think, quite simple. Set a date - say 2017 - after which if a TOC wants to run a service which is end-to-end under the wires (or beside the 3rd rail), and uses a diesel, an automatic £5000 fine is levied. Fair?

 

[fsmr]

Factor in the cost in CO2 emissions of transporting and constructing the OLE and maintaining and repairing it, not to mention transmissions losses from the power station to the train and things look less rosy. Nuclear is the only option for reliable generation if we must leave gas and coal behind, as folks wont be too pleased to have their train cancelled due to the wrong kind of wind
Oh wait yeh we already do that with OLE

I can see an argument for trains running over 125 mph due to the power requirements when yu start to get ino serious wind resistance, and also on rapid start stop suburban's , but not on the ECML especially where part of the journey ends up outside the wires
Cant wait for the MML to be electrified :roll:

 

[thealexweb]

I regularly use Musselburgh on the ECML. It annoys me to see 158s/170s being used on North Berwick / Dunbar services. I know they do this because they don't have enough 380s but its still wasteful.

 

[FQ]

I agree I was disapointed booked a trip to York on Trainline.com, got an east coast HST going up and a Grand Central comming back, I wanted a ride on a MK4 set seemed a waste of all that money in the knitting

The 43s are only used on routes that are necessary like the Harrogates, the Hulls, the Lincolns, the Inverness, the Skiptons and the Aberdeens.
The GC HSTs are on the Sunderlands which isn't wired all the way.
Anyway, the MK4s are terrible with less room. if I had the chance I would definitely travel from Kings Cross-Edinburgh on HST and Edinburgh-Kings Cross on HST instead of 91.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

I agree I was disapointed booked a trip to York on Trainline.com, got an east coast HST going up and a Grand Central comming back, I wanted a ride on a MK4 set seemed a waste of all that money in the knitting

To be fair there is a good chance that the East COast HST came from North of Edinburgh and the Grand Central HST serves non-electrified lines and the 'DC' overhead electrified station at Sunderland.

....My proposal is, I think, quite simple. Set a date - say 2017 - after which if a TOC wants to run a service which is end-to-end under the wires (or beside the 3rd rail), and uses a diesel, an automatic £5000 fine is levied. Fair?

Not really. Essentially, the DfT decides who has what stock, okay, that's over simplifying, but if a TOC wants new trains it has to talk to them. But even if you exclude the services that have to run under the wires because of the DfT, you still get quite a complex situation.

You see, AIUI (and again I might be over simplifying), TOCs get fined if they cancel trains and they get fined if they run late, and at a particular point cancelling becomes cheaper then running late. So a late running diesel under the wires service is more likely to be cancelled on financial grounds if a fine were introduced, and, imo, that is counter-productive.

 

[RichmondCommu]

The 43s are only used on routes that are necessary like the Harrogates, the Hulls, the Lincolns, the Inverness, the Skiptons and the Aberdeens.
The GC HSTs are on the Sunderlands which isn't wired all the way.
Anyway, the MK4s are terrible with less room. if I had the chance I would definitely travel from Kings Cross-Edinburgh on HST and Edinburgh-Kings Cross on HST instead of 91.

In all fairness I don't see why you can't run a 225 up to Skipton

 

[dave59]

225's do run to Skipton, but the rail industry does not do things very quickly, so it took a while for them to do the tests (22 years). They found that running them was possible without stopping all the 333's.

 

[transmanche]

The 43s are only used on routes that are necessary like the Harrogates, the Hulls, the Lincolns, the Inverness, the Skiptons and the Aberdeens.

HSTs are also used on plenty of London-Leeds/Newcastle/Edinburgh services too. I think there are even three HST diagrams where the sets run completely under the wires all day.

EC just don't have enough 91+MK4 sets to cover all their services under the wires.

 

[edwin_m]

In an ideal world East Coast would have a couple more electrics, but as they haven't they have to run some diesels under the wires, such as many of the Newark and York terminators. Some of these probably also run to non-electrified destinations as part of the day's diagram. I believe the original 31 electric sets are now down to 29, due to accident damage to the coaches and probably also lower availability of the class 91s than originally expected. But no doubt someone who knows more will be along soon to comment on this.

In the short term it's not economic to build a handful of high-speed electric sets and there are none available to lease. The IEP procurement should resolve this particular problem, at the cost of introducing a whole new debate about the merits of dragging dead diesel engines around when working on electric power.

As stated, a diesel engine and an electric power station plus transmission are broadly similar in overall efficiency. However the electric starts to win due to "decarbonisation" of the supply (yet another debate!) but also because more modern units can regenerate power when slowing down. This reduces consumption by typically 15-20%.

 

[Cherry_Picker]

Thanks for the quick responses, though I must say I hadn't intended to prompt a debate about Fusion vs Fission!

My proposal is, I think, quite simple. Set a date - say 2017 - after which if a TOC wants to run a service which is end-to-end under the wires (or beside the 3rd rail), and uses a diesel, an automatic £5000 fine is levied. Fair?

There would just be a massive cutback in services, surely? The problem we have is that there are more services running on the network than can be handled by number the electric trains TOCs have access too. It's not like there is an evil man with a twirly moustache laughing maniacally as he chooses to send out a diesel train while the electric one sits in the sidings.

 

[RichmondCommu]

In an ideal world East Coast would have a couple more electrics, but as they haven't they have to run some diesels under the wires, such as many of the Newark and York terminators.

I don't use the ECML very often but why are we terminating services at Newark? Why not run them to Leeds, or even Doncaster?

 

[transmanche]

I don't use the ECML very often but why are we terminating services at Newark? Why not run them to Leeds, or even Doncaster?

On even hours the xx:08 from King's Cross goes to Newark Northgate, but the original plan was to run them to Lincoln. (On odd hours, it goes to York instead.)

 

[Tim R-T-C]

225's do run to Skipton, but the rail industry does not do things very quickly, so it took a while for them to do the tests (22 years). They found that running them was possible without stopping all the 333's.

Not very often, it was booked for a 91 at a time, but I always see an HST when I am up early enough to catch it. Don't know if it was an issue they found or just stock availability.

 

[kermit]

It's not like there is an evil man with a twirly moustache laughing maniacally as he chooses to send out a diesel train while the electric one sits in the sidings.

Ha Ha!! There has, however, been mass export and scrapping of not-life-expired electric power (Class 87s). I know they couldn't keep up with 125mph diagrams, (or could they, with some modifications and 6-7 coach rakes?), but surely better than Voyagers spewing diesel fumes at the 25kV cables? And a much better experience to stand on a platform next to a silent Mk3, rather than a deafening Voyager.

Anyway, paranoia about the man with the twirly moustache fuels half the internet, so if you burst that bubble where does it leave us??

 

[sprinterguy]

HSTs are also used on plenty of London-Leeds/Newcastle/Edinburgh services too. I think there are even three HST diagrams where the sets run completely under the wires all day.

Indeed. At York, there seems to be a certain time on an afternoon, when I am often to be found in the York Tap watching the world go by, when you could be forgiven for thinking that the electrification of the ECML never happened. In a short space of time there is something like three East Coast and one Grand Central HSTs passing through, plus the obligatory Crosscountry Voyagers and TPEs 185s, with nary an electric in sight!
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

In an ideal world East Coast would have a couple more electrics, but as they haven't they have to run some diesels under the wires, such as many of the Newark and York terminators. Some of these probably also run to non-electrified destinations as part of the day's diagram. I believe the original 31 electric sets are now down to 29, due to accident damage to the coaches and probably also lower availability of the class 91s than originally expected. But no doubt someone who knows more will be along soon to comment on this.

There are thirty full 225 sets, with thirty one locos.

 

[dave59]

The way the railway is set up means that DfT/TOC really like a mix of deisels in there (on both ECML and WCML) It helps with robustness in times of OHLE failures and engineering works so no effort whatsoever has been made to use existing electric locomotives. Only excuses not to.

The nonsense of deisel engines rumbling away under the new glass roof of Kings Cross station should finally end when the IEP arrives and further electrification is completed. Not a moment too soon.

 

[302PS]

Most Joe bloggs passengers couldn't give a monkeys if they were getting on a pacer or a pendo so long as it gets them home

 

[TorqueOfTheDevil]

I have sometimes wondered why it's not possible to procure a fleet of 125 mph-capable electric locos to haul diesel stock under the wires up to the point where the wires stop (eg Crewe for Holyhead, Edinburgh for Inverness/Aberdeen). There clearly is a reason why this is a bad idea, but could somebody explain it please?