Network Rail's Traction Decarbonisation Network Strategy published

[Meerkat]

The future of metering (and car charging) will be a lot smarter than that!

You will be able to set your charge ‘want’ via your phone, and then the car / meter will work it all out for you in the most efficient way, responding to variations in the price of electricity. You will have the facility to set how much range you need by, say 0700 tomorrow, then the car / meter system will know how much charge you need, the forecast forward prices, and then book you in the right time to charge most cheaply.

If you don’t need full range the next day, and aren’t going anywhere until later in the day (like me, today) It may well also charge more than is necessary overnight to make use of cheap electricity (it was about £12/MWh at 0600 today), and sell it back when it’s more pricey (currently £36). A car with a 100kwh battery could easily make you a few quid a day if you’re not using it much.

What will that do for battery life?
Does remind me a bit of our current flexible cheap rail fares system......and how there is now a clamour to spoil it with ‘simplicity’

 

[Philip Phlopp]

What will that do for battery life?
Does remind me a bit of our current flexible cheap rail fares system......and how there is now a clamour to spoil it with ‘simplicity’

It'll probably cost you about .5% of battery capacity a year in using your car as a portable grid battery.

General motoring use on typical mileages sees battery capacity dropping by roughly 1% per year - much, much, much less than previously expected and well below what many manufacturers were thinking, at one point various manufacturers were thinking of having swappable battery packs rather than rapid chargers, as they expected battery capacity to drop so quickly as batteries aged they wanted to be able to drip feed in new battery packs and remove old ones. That quickly fell apart with some bankruptcies.

Renault did do a battery lease scheme, that ended last year, when it became clear there was no real issue about battery life over the period where a manufacturer would be expected to really support owners (7-10 years).

 

[Jozhua]

On page 82: "The existing projects on the Midland Main Line and Transpennine provide a key delivery opportunity to provide further electrification of these routes. Continuation of current delivery will give a smooth programme of works that allows skills and experience to be retained for the large volume of electrification work required within the wider region. The deployment of further electrification in these areas is likely to feature as a high priority for delivery."
Is this plea for continuity by keeping teams together so as not to lose skills and experience quite a notable statement at long last of Network Rail's wish to press ahead with these two major projects? Maybe Roger Ford's regular reminders in Twitter to DfT that the MML project is spade-ready may yet bear fruit ...

Yeah, it's a plea for continuity.

However, the beancounters at the DfT can't wait to make a decision that will be poor in the long term, but will save them some money today.

There are a ton of shovel ready projects that will significantly improve service across the country, all for a fairly reasonable sum. They will not be done because the DfT is incompetent and incapable of any kind of sensible, coherent long term planning.

Have I missed something? People seem to be talking as if this report has a chance of being implemented.

Having seen many such reports come and go, I will hold fire until at least the frozen bits of MML and GWML are restarted before getting too excited.

Yep, lol.

No chance of implementation. Diesel till 2100!

Again, this focus on the number of diesel engines (which if anything stays neutral as the new bimodes replace the voyagers, one in, one out). If increasing the number of diesel LDHS means reducing the number of diesel elsewhere (or indeed increasing the number and running them half as often) then it is the better thing to do. The aim is to reduce carbon emissions, not reduce the number of diesel LHDS on the network (albeit there is a link)



With the 810s, it's been calculated that there's enough for about half of the trains in service to be run at double length, and because of the diagrams those working the morning peak into St Pancras also work those leaving St Pancras in the evening. The people ordering and operating the trains have the passenger numbers for each service, and I at least have confidence in them to arrange their stock in the best way, although discussing long vs short train is getting off topic!



Those dates seem about right. 5 years of bi-mode operation shouldn't be sniffed at: each Manchester service would gain ~100 miles of electric running, each Edinburgh service ~200 miles, some quick back of the envelope calculations show about 8000 daily miles that could go over to electric running using the current wires. Over those 5 years, that's 14 million miles not run on diesel and that's before considering that the diesel miles will themselves will have a much lower emission of CO2

Scrapping voyagers is without a doubt the right thing to do. They're done their time, and have no further use. Remove the engines (again, Cummins QSK19 is a versatile engine that can be put to work in all manner of sectors) and scrap them. 25 years is by no means a bad innings

Voyagers are grim and I'd love to see em go, however, I'd like to see the trains lengthened first.

I very nearly added that at the time of writing!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 14 Sep 2020 ==

Two thoughts for mix:

1) The potential 3rd rail depending on ORR /RSSB risk assessment review - If it heads towards 3rd rail this is largely independent of the OHLE workstreams and could be delivered relatively quickly. If it does get a potential nod as the way to go the key thing is to make sure all track renewals use enough sleepers with 3rd rail fitting holes when doing track renewals before you actually get round to doing the electrification to make it quicker and easier when you do.

2) Getting sensibly sized fleets of diesel and battery Bimode units for <100mph services that are ETCS capable and have SDO etc so they have future go anywhere capability would really help as regards a rolling programme where the biggest challenge to roll out isn't intercity services.

New 3rd rail doesn't seem to be happening. We've had this debate many times on the forum and I've even been for it, however, the ORR says no. I mean putting a cover on it, like they do around New York for subway and commuter rail lines would probably improve safety somewhat, but it just seems to be a no go.

Personally, I think if we were willing to be inventive, say only power certain sections when the train is within them, cover the tops of the rails, etc it could be made safer to within a decent margin of OHLE. I know the Bordeaux tram has a power system in-between the rails that is safe enough to be in the middle of a street. Our restrictive loading gauge does make adding OHLE quite expensive with new tunnels and whatnot, so maybe an advanced 3rd rail system could be quite effective.

Alstom APS

This is using translate on my browser, so I apologise:

Cities wishing to install a tram can today do without bulky overhead contact lines and thus preserve both their historical heritage and the urban environment. Alstom's APS ground-based power supply system is a proven, high-performance solution currently in operation in seven cities on three continents. It supplies electricity to trams safely and reliably over short sections without overhead lines or over the entire line.


Efficient and safe
Inspired by the “third rail” power supply systems found in metro networks, APS supplies vehicles through segments 11 meters long inserted into the ground between the running rails. These segments are switched on automatically when the tram passes, which eliminates any risk for other road users. This principle of safety has been certified by several competent bodies around the world.

Nope, electric cars can do long distance too.

Generating capacity isn’t the problem. There’s plenty of that coming on line in the next decade - a near doubling of wind power*, and more nuclear than is being retired (assuming Sizewell C gets built, which looks very likely). Plus the commissioning of various connectors to Europe and Norway.

The problem is the grid itself, and local distribution networks. But this is being worked on, and by the time that 50% of cars are EVs (another decade or so) it will be sorted.

*if all the currently consented wind energy projects are built, the country will have more than 40GW (peak) of wind capacity. There about another 10GW in planning that hasn’t yet been consented. Clearly that’s a maximum on a windy day across the whole country, but given that national peak demand is only above 40GW on winter evenings, it can provide plenty of power. Particularly with the energy storage capability of 10s of millions of batteries sat in various parking spots across the country.

So the issue is that electric cars use considerably more power than electric trains, or electric public transportation. This also applies for any energy source the vehicles run on, steel on steel is just going to be more efficient than tyres, and even a bus has the benefit of (on average), not having two tons of metal per each rider. The issues with cars don't just end with pollution though, there is congestion, safety and space, all things that are growing issues as we increasingly live in urban areas. Electric cars will not resolve this and even if self driving cars come along, they will questionably be able to assist with congestion and safety, with space still being a major factor.

Providing electrical power for the equivalent number of rail journeys will put much less stress on the grid and will be easier to wire up, considering we don't need to re-do the wiring to everyone's homes.

Plus, why should people need to drive an electric car long distance? The train has the potential to provide a much shorter journey time and a chance to sit back and enjoy the view as you pass by traffic. We could have good high-speed services not only for London, but for the routes XC or Transpennine Express run. I'm sure wiring these up will be a good step towards reducing journey times.

Not all motorists, but many will be. If you know you are likely to need a long journey in the morning, you will tell the car that, and it will keep it charged. If you know you won’t need it, then it may give up some charge.

The incentives for doing this will be sufficient to make people think about it. It’s quite conceivable that EV car owners could make £100 a month or more from providing what is known as ‘demand response’ from their batteries.

So, that's another £50 a month onto everyone's electricity bills...

I witnessed DfT being told this a decade ago, due to DfT staff rotation this knowledge will have been lost several times over in that decade...

Sounds like the DfT we know and love alright!

 

[Bald Rick]

There are a ton of shovel ready projects that will significantly improve service across the country, all for a fairly reasonable sum.

Could you let us know what they are, as there’s quite a few people who would like to know.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

It would depend on one’s definition of shovel ready of course.

 

[Domh245]

New 3rd rail doesn't seem to be happening. We've had this debate many times on the forum and I've even been for it, however, the ORR says no. I mean putting a cover on it, like they do around New York for subway and commuter rail lines would probably improve safety somewhat, but it just seems to be a no go.

You seem to have missed the story a couple of months back about the ORR/RSSB investigating the possibility of allowing new third rail installations. Would seem that they're warming to the idea of allowing it, if not actually yet authorising

 

[Jozhua]

Could you let us know what they are, as there’s quite a few people who would like to know.

It was from Gareth Dennis' appearence on Channel 4 Dispatches, where he put forward the top 10 rail bottlenecks.

He has a map here:
Top 10 GB Rail Pinch Points

Including:
-Birmingham New Street
-Castlefield Corridor
-Didcot Area
-Exeter to Plymouth
-Leeds Station and approaches

He also has a Podcast Episode about it, where he goes into more detail, so I'm going to listen to that in a bit!

You seem to have missed the story a couple of months back about the ORR/RSSB investigating the possibility of allowing new third rail installations. Would seem that they're warming to the idea of allowing it, if not actually yet authorising

Hmm, interesting. It mostly seems to be around adding some limited extensions to the current network, which I'm pretty sure was allowed under current policy anyway.

I think if we were willing to add coverboards or top contact, this could possibly add more safety, along with the shorter isolated sections I mentioned. There are plenty of dual mode EMUs, so the option of mixing 3rd rail and 25KV lines could be good to have.

Probably a bad example, but say you have 3rd rail on the Windermere branch, then you can have fully electric running from Windermere to Manchester Airport, allowing you to remove diesel from the equation entirely.

 

[jfowkes]

It was from Gareth Dennis' appearence on Channel 4 Dispatches, where he put forward the top 10 rail bottlenecks

Did he ever actually use the phrase "shovel ready" though?

I'd interpret that phrase to mean that plans are advanced that at least some initial enabling works can begin. I'm not sure any of those pinch points really qualify.

 

[Domh245]

Hmm, interesting. It mostly seems to be around adding some limited extensions to the current network, which I'm pretty sure was allowed under current policy anyway.

I think if we were willing to add coverboards or top contact, this could possibly add more safety, along with the shorter isolated sections I mentioned. There are plenty of dual mode EMUs, so the option of mixing 3rd rail and 25KV lines could be good to have.

Probably a bad example, but say you have 3rd rail on the Windermere branch, then you can have fully electric running from Windermere to Manchester Airport, allowing you to remove diesel from the equation entirely.

Define short! A few hundred meters was previously permissible, this is looking at things like Uckfield and Marshlink (and the other Diesel islands in the third rail domain) which are too long under existing guidance, but could possibly be allowed for the sake of fleet simplicity and isolated stretches of OLE miles away from the next nearest bit

I presume you mean bottom contact - the main third rail network is top contact, things like the DLR are bottom contact - it's relative to the rail, not the pickup shoe. I severely doubt we'd see bottom contact though, there's an existing standard for conductor rails on the network, and if you're going to introduce something non-standard, you might as well bite the bullet and go for OLE with it's inherent advantages. Coverboards are likely, 'APS' style short switching sections aren't (I'm fairly sure it was discussed in a few different threads over the years and the consensus is that it won't work at Mainline scale in terms of vehicle speeds and currents)

Like I said earlier, the only places this would be set to make a difference are places like Uckfield, Marshlink and possibly Salisbury-Southampton. Nobody in their right mind is suggesting third rail installations away from the existing network.

 

[Bald Rick]

It was from Gareth Dennis' appearence on Channel 4 Dispatches, where he put forward the top 10 rail bottlenecks.

He has a map here:
Top 10 GB Rail Pinch Points

Including:
-Birmingham New Street
-Castlefield Corridor
-Didcot Area
-Exeter to Plymouth
-Leeds Station and approaches

He also has a Podcast Episode about it, where he goes into more detail, so I'm going to listen to that in a bit

Oh, I didn’t realise he was fully appraised of the current development status of NRs enhancement portfolio.

What are the ‘shovel ready’ proposals for these places anyway?

 

[hwl]

Hmm, interesting. It mostly seems to be around adding some limited extensions to the current network, which I'm pretty sure was allowed under current policy anyway.

I think if we were willing to add coverboards or top contact, this could possibly add more safety, along with the shorter isolated sections I mentioned. There are plenty of dual mode EMUs, so the option of mixing 3rd rail and 25KV lines could be good to have.

Probably a bad example, but say you have 3rd rail on the Windermere branch, then you can have fully electric running from Windermere to Manchester Airport, allowing you to remove diesel from the equation entirely.

As I previously said (but you chose to ignore without checking on the review or the reasons for it) the review only applies to a very limited number of four locations in 3rd rail land labelled "alternative" in the plan. These would struggle under the existing criteria for extensions which are based on relatively old stats and options, hence the review. This isn't about mixing 3rd rail and OHLE it is about gaps in 3rd rail only and avoiding mixing 3rd rail and OHLE.
The 4 areas are:
Uckfield
Marsh Link
North Downs Line
Isle of Grain

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 26 Sep 2020 ==

New 3rd rail doesn't seem to be happening. We've had this debate many times on the forum and I've even been for it, however, the ORR says no. I mean putting a cover on it, like they do around New York for subway and commuter rail lines would probably improve safety somewhat, but it just seems to be a no go.

Personally, I think if we were willing to be inventive, say only power certain sections when the train is within them, cover the tops of the rails, etc it could be made safer to within a decent margin of OHLE. I know the Bordeaux tram has a power system in-between the rails that is safe enough to be in the middle of a street. Our restrictive loading gauge does make adding OHLE quite expensive with new tunnels and whatnot, so maybe an advanced 3rd rail system could be quite effective.

Alstom APS

I'm fully aware of Alstom's APS system and it limitations. Try engineering it for 240m long trains in 3rd rail land is a very different kettle of fish to short low speed tram usage (see previous comments from myself and others in other threads on the technical issues when it has been brought up). Since Bordeaux everywhere (e.g. starting with Seville) has gone for battery, that should suggest something....

 

[Meerkat]

You seem to have missed the story a couple of months back about the ORR/RSSB investigating the possibility of allowing new third rail installations. Would seem that they're warming to the idea of allowing it, if not actually yet authorising

”some people say your decision is ridiculous, can you have another look?”
”OK , we will go back over the report and make sure it comes back as DEFINITELY dangerous this time”

 

[ABB125]

You seem to have missed the story a couple of months back about the ORR/RSSB investigating the possibility of allowing new third rail installations. Would seem that they're warming to the idea of allowing it, if not actually yet authorising

”some people say your decision is ridiculous, can you have another look?”
”OK , we will go back over the report and make sure it comes back as DEFINITELY dangerous this time”

I wonder what the ORR's attitude would be if it had to pay for the increased operating costs due to operators running small diesel fleets on mostly 3rd rail electrified routes...

 

[WatcherZero]

Its always been ORR policy to allow extensions of 3rd rail where it was the most economical choice, its never been a matter of 'just a few hundred meters'.
To give another example of that after the GRIP 3 of the Skelmersdale rail link was completed earlier this year a new piece of work has been commissioned by NR to investigate the actual procurement costs of 3rd rail and what equipment compliant with current standards is on the market so it can be fully compared to the option of overhead electrification of the extension.

 

[Jozhua]

Confuses me as to why Reading to Guildford and Gatwick Airport isn't 3rd railed.

I stand corrected that Not all of Gareth's projects are 'shovel ready', but there are a couple that are, and I can personally name another (Hope Valley), that is as well.

I'm not a big believer in the practicality of 3rd rail expansion, but I was entertaining the possibility of a safer 3rd rail system for more widespread use, considering the ORR review. 3rd rail is cool, but probably just not that practical for new schemes going forward.

Ultimately we come to "boom and bust" cycles, although these days it's mostly "bust". Network Rail is trying to piece together some strategy for decarbonisation, but ultimately until some actual plans come out of Westminster for a wider decarbonisation strategy (and funding for it), it is nothing but "warm air".

I'm sure the treasury will bless us with a £500,000 feasibility study into the possibility of running trains off this new fangled thing called "electricity". Its super interesting, means we don't need to store the fossil fuel burning gubbins on the train itself.

 

[paul1609]

As I previously said (but you chose to ignore without checking on the review or the reasons for it) the review only applies to a very limited number of four locations in 3rd rail land labelled "alternative" in the plan. These would struggle under the existing criteria for extensions which are based on relatively old stats and options, hence the review. This isn't about mixing 3rd rail and OHLE it is about gaps in 3rd rail only and avoiding mixing 3rd rail and OHLE.
The 4 areas are:
Uckfield
Marsh Link
North Downs Line
Isle of Grain

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 26 Sep 2020 ==


I'm fully aware of Alstom's APS system and it limitations. Try engineering it for 240m long trains in 3rd rail land is a very different kettle of fish to short low speed tram usage (see previous comments from myself and others in other threads on the technical issues when it has been brought up). Since Bordeaux everywhere (e.g. starting with Seville) has gone for battery, that should suggest something....

In the case of Marshlink the station at one end of the line is already over 2/3rd dual electrified. The disused International Station provides ample ac capacity for the whole branch. All of the three brands serving the station have dual voltage stock likely to be under utilised following covid/wfh. The branch has little in the way of overhead structures. Lightweight overheads deemed suitable for 120 kmh on the nearby continent would be ample. We just need to be rid of the dragarse Networkrail.

 

[Bald Rick]

We just need to be rid of the dragarse Networkrail.

I think that’s a little misplaced. Network Rail will happily electrify anywhere - so long as someone provides the money. NR has no money of its own for electrification, not even feasibility studies.

So you should be directing your ire at those who have the money.

 

[Philip Phlopp]

In the case of Marshlink the station at one end of the line is already over 2/3rd dual electrified. The disused International Station provides ample ac capacity for the whole branch. All of the three brands serving the station have dual voltage stock likely to be under utilised following covid/wfh. The branch has little in the way of overhead structures. Lightweight overheads deemed suitable for 120 kmh on the nearby continent would be ample. We just need to be rid of the dragarse Networkrail.

Dragarse Network Rail has been pushing to electrify Marshlink since we were Dragarse British Rail, we've tried with both 750V DC, 25kV AC and we're probably almost back to 750V DC again. DfT won't write the cheque. The line has always been kept in a semi ready to electrify state with third rail sleepers in significant numbers and DC immunised signalling for the most part.

A quick point about the lightweight overheads though - fine if there's sufficient number and you can keep stock for spares, more of a problem than a solution if you decide to electrify a shortish branch in isolation with a bespoke system, the choice of catenary was always going to be an interesting issue for Marshlink, if 25kV was authorised.