How can public transport cut energy use

[dk1]

There's definitely focus on the ancillaries, such as depot heating or station lighting etc. There's really not much point in focusing on the traction energy though it has to be said.

I’ve not noticed any as you say since “Switch it Off” near a switch in the 90s. At my depot the boiler goes ten to the dozen with radiators red hot & windows wide open.

 

[AndrewE]

There's really not much point in focusing on the traction energy though it has to be said.

Really? I would have thought that as it is the lions' share of what the railway uses it is worth thinking about - and building into strategy. Maybe not a lot to be done now, although don't the French TGV routes have coasting boards where on-time trains can cut power? A more resilient timetable might allow more of that here.

Higher speed gobbles up power (3rd - or higher? [mathematical] power of speed) and, to my mind, service frequency and reliability is more important anyway: Timetables need to be re-drawn to provide a good service for the whole country with connectivity as a priority, rather than the Balkanised airline-on-wheels express services we have on some lines currently.

Voyagers are apparently notoriously fuel-hungry, and there must be figures for the other fleets. Need to learn from this for future procurement.

Ancillaries on trains also need to be considered, both at the design stage and in use. (I saw that the Germans are experimenting with solar pv on the roof of a bus trailer because the hauling bus can't supply eneough electricity to power the a/c on both https://www.ra ilforums.co.uk/threads/solar-panel-on-munich-trailer-bus.229913 I would ask whether they can't just have better-insulated and ventilated trailers that are bearable in the summer...)

We all need to recognise that our high demands have energy implications: faster trains, warmer interiors in winter, air-conditioning in summer... Just adjust our expectations and dress for the season!

 

[miklcct]

If you really want to save energy, reduce speed. Set an absolute maximum speed limit of 75mph, would save a fortune in energy costs. You'd get an additional saving as new stock could be built to lower crash protection standards, saving weight. High speed travel is no longer affordable.

While you're at it, revert back to the days of the Arab oil crisis and impose a max 50mph national speed limit for all vehicles, enforced by cameras. LOTS of cameras. Should reduce fuel use, and push some to use public transport

Finally, ban, or tax out of existence, all oversized tonka toys aka MPVs/SUVs such as Range Rovers or BMW x-series. Horrendous energy wasters

You will wipe out the economy of the whole country outside London, and make London overcrowded by doing this as people can no longer commute from Folkestone / Brighton / Basingstoke / Reading / etc! Brighton will turn from a vibe seaside city to a fishing village like those in Cornwall nowadays!

The best way to cut energy usage is to fill the trains and buses with people who would otherwise be driving cars. We need to take a holistic view.

Then please give us a Saturday service on Sundays first.

 

[Ken H]

TPE DMUs have a facility to run with 1 engune turned off when all the power isnt needed to keep to the timetable. Saves fuel and maintenance

 

[Irascible]

Higher speed gobbles up power (3rd - or higher? [mathematical] power of speed) and, to my mind, service frequency and reliability is more important anyway: Timetables need to be re-drawn to provide a good service for

More on point might be "higher speed gobbles ever increasing power for ever decreasing benefits" ( it's aerodynamic drag that is murderous, there are a couple of types to consider but the maths is easy to find ). I'm sure there's an illustrative graph or two if someone has any idea where to get data from a route or two...

Maybe someone can do the maths to work out the optimal train length if you slowed them all to 75mph, because you're either looking at more trains or more intervals.

 

[zwk500]

You will wipe out the economy of the whole country outside London, and make London overcrowded by doing this as people can no longer commute from Folkestone / Brighton / Basingstoke / Reading / etc! Brighton will turn from a vibe seaside city to a fishing village like those in Cornwall nowadays!

Dropping the speed of the Brighton line to 75mph will have a very limited extension to journey time, given how often trains stop and where the speeds are already lower than 75mph. Basingtoke and Reading would have a more noticeable impact but even then 50 miles @ 125mph is c.30 mins, at 75mph it's still only c.45mins.

A more realistic objection would be journey times to Manchester, Leeds, Newcastle or Scotland.

 

[Irascible]

A more realistic objection would be journey times to Manchester, Leeds, Newcastle or Scotland.

And the actual problem there is not so much that it's slower, but it's also now sufficiently slower than the plane to start people flying again.

Ban internal flights under a certain time/distance too? good luck selling that

( also yes, as someone in Devon I'll take an average speed of 75mph any day that'd be quite the upgrade ).

 

[zwk500]

And the actual problem there is not so much that it's slower, but it's also now sufficiently slower than the plane to start people flying again.

Ban internal flights under a certain time/distance too? good luck selling that

A Carbon/Passenger-KM tax on flights would be perfectly workable. It would incentivise airlines to use more efficient planes, and raise prices of air fares so passengers 'shop around' a bit more. But that's a bit off-topic.

Dropping all 125mph OLE to 100-110mph and 100mph 3rd rail to 90mph is worth looking at what the actual energy benefit would be against the journey time loss.

 

[C96]

I think there’s a growing desire to be seen as middle class even with £50k - £70k earnings, whereas the public don’t realise its £100k + that is really middle class

 

[zwk500]

I think there’s a growing desire to be seen as middle class even with £50k - £70k earnings, whereas the public don’t realise its £100k + that is really middle class

Is this the thread you meant to post this on?

 

[Lucan]

Ban internal flights under a certain time/distance too? good luck selling that

I thought the French had done that, or are planning to.

 

[zwk500]

I thought the French had done that, or are planning to.

They have passed the law, I think, but it does exclude connecting flights so you can still fly Lyon-Paris as long as you are flying onwards to somewhere else which rather defeats the point. I don't know if you can sell tickets for Lyon-Paris only on such a flight.

 

[randyrippley]

You will wipe out the economy of the whole country outside London, and make London overcrowded by doing this as people can no longer commute from Folkestone / Brighton / Basingstoke / Reading / etc! Brighton will turn from a vibe seaside city to a fishing village like those in Cornwall nowadays!

Not so!
What destroys the economy outside London is extended commuting along with easy-access second homes which together force up the price of property to a point where housing is unaffordable to the local population. The resulting drop in the younger end of the workforce means companies are short staffed, unable to find new entrants. Commuting depresses communities, it doesn't benefit them

 

[miklcct]

Not so!
What destroys the economy outside London is extended commuting along with easy-access second homes which together force up the price of property to a point where housing is unaffordable to the local population. The resulting drop in the younger end of the workforce means companies are short staffed, unable to find new entrants. Commuting depresses communities, it doesn't benefit them

If I were rich I would buy two homes, one for summer and one for winter, renting out the other in the off-season.

And young people leave communities because there aren't career opportunities outside big cities, and even if we compare Manchester to London, London has much more career opportunities than Manchester. If we forbid long-distance commuting the house price in London will soon match Hong Kong.

 

[Ken H]

Not so!
What destroys the economy outside London is extended commuting along with easy-access second homes which together force up the price of property to a point where housing is unaffordable to the local population. The resulting drop in the younger end of the workforce means companies are short staffed, unable to find new entrants. Commuting depresses communities, it doesn't benefit them

But thats not what has happened. people have moved away from the cities to work from home. 2 homes near me with new people in who are WFH.

 

[Energy]

The best thing we can do to cut costs is get out of our heads looney ideas around it being acceptable to pay more for energy on environmental grounds. Ditch the climate change levies, start digging up coal again if it can be done more cheaply than importing fuel at current prices, focus in on home-grown schemes like fracking, and really wind up on programslike nuclear.

While nuclear isn't a bad idea coal is, wind and solar don't have to be more expensive. While solar isn't suited to the UK (high land costs, not particularly sunny) wind is and already makes up about 40% of the UK's electricity, thats the same as gas. The cost of wind and solar is also expected to drop as more investment is going into it.

As for the railway, electrification should be a priority. How do trains get their heat for the interior?

 

[Bald Rick]

Has anyone said ’run fewer trains’ yet?

 

[zwk500]

Has anyone said ’run fewer trains’ yet?

Post #2

Lights by themselves are not a major issue. To cut costs, installing solar panels on every roof and canopy would help a lot.
To cut usage, traction will be the biggest area to focus on. Less trains, more efficient motors, regenerative braking etc.

 

[Bald Rick]

Post #2

fewer, not less

good point about solar panels - typical financial payback is now 5-7 years on the investment, which is rather better than almost every rail investment.

 

[Starmill]

Really? I would have thought that as it is the lions' share of what the railway uses it is worth thinking about - and building into strategy. Maybe not a lot to be done now, although don't the French TGV routes have coasting boards where on-time trains can cut power? A more resilient timetable might allow more of that here.

Higher speed gobbles up power (3rd - or higher? [mathematical] power of speed) and, to my mind, service frequency and reliability is more important anyway: Timetables need to be re-drawn to provide a good service for the whole country with connectivity as a priority, rather than the Balkanised airline-on-wheels express services we have on some lines currently.

Voyagers are apparently notoriously fuel-hungry, and there must be figures for the other fleets. Need to learn from this for future procurement.

Ancillaries on trains also need to be considered, both at the design stage and in use. (I saw that the Germans are experimenting with solar pv on the roof of a bus trailer because the hauling bus can't supply eneough electricity to power the a/c on both https://www.ra ilforums.co.uk/threads/solar-panel-on-munich-trailer-bus.229913 I would ask whether they can't just have better-insulated and ventilated trailers that are bearable in the summer...)

We all need to recognise that our high demands have energy implications: faster trains, warmer interiors in winter, air-conditioning in summer... Just adjust our expectations and dress for the season!

I could have chosen clearer phrasing. There's every bit a good focus on the efficient use of traction energy in the background i.e. replacement of fleet and electrification. However those thinga have actually been done and will continue to be. What there's not much point in doing is trying to reduce the maximum speed of trains to save energy. It doesn't save much and it does cause issues.

I agree that in general we do demand too much energy, but I don't think that it's very practical for public transport users to do much about that. Of course, not unless you're suggesting restrictions on air conditioning in private cars.

 

[zwk500]

fewer, not less

I'll give you that one!

 

[yorksrob]

Has anyone said ’run fewer trains’ yet?

Clearly not. What would be the benefits of that in satisfying passenger needs ?

 

[Bald Rick]

Clearly not. What would be the benefits of that in satisfying passenger needs ?

that wasn’t the question. The question was:

what measures can public transport concerns do to cut energy use?

running fewer trains is clearly one possible answer to that, albeit not one that is necessarily desirable. (Although it might be on some lightly used services, such as my 5MW train home last night that had about 30 people on it.)

 

[SynthD]

Shut doors quicker? Make adverts saying bring a jumper, we’ve turned down the heating. With how busy off peak trains are, the human heaters are enough.

If it doesn’t screw up regenerative braking’s input to the power supply too much, can drivers be told to coast more?

 

[yorksrob]

that wasn’t the question. The question was:



running fewer trains is clearly one possible answer to that, albeit not one that is necessarily desirable. (Although it might be on some lightly used services, such as my 5MW train home last night that had about 30 people on it.)

Well it's meaningless taking the question out of the wider policy context. You must know that.

 

[mmh]

Electrification

Yes, that magic electricity. Dear me.

 

[AM9]

that wasn’t the question. The question was:



running fewer trains is clearly one possible answer to that, albeit not one that is necessarily desirable. (Although it might be on some lightly used services, such as my 5MW train home last night that had about 30 people on it.)

The 5MW is rarely used except for short bursts of acceleration, and a braking profile can recover much of those bursts.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

Yes, that magic electricity. Dear me.

So so so much more efficient (and thus reduces energy use) than hauling your fuel around aka diesel locomotive.

 

[zwk500]

Yes, that magic electricity. Dear me.

Regenerative braking converts the movement energy back into electricity that can power the trains. A diesel train can't refill its tanks from the movement of the train.

 

[Starmill]

Well it's meaningless taking the question out of the wider policy context. You must know that.

The difficulty is that current policy context is heavily in favour of private motoring. The government's answer to the question posed is is all but "use your car". Or perhaps fly. Either way, we can russel up a tax break for you. But please don't ask us to fund your buses properly, you know that's not how it works.