Great Western Coffee Shop

It is reported in the BBC* (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-48233548) that Dft believes that the recognition of a Climate Emergency by parliament (See BBC* (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48126677)) and the Committee on Climate Change recommendations for Net zero carbon by 2050 (See BBC* (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-48122911)) means that the the UK's aviation strategy may need to be reviewed.


The article reports that Plan B - a pressure group is saying that this means that the decision on Heathrow expansion should be revisited. 

So what does this mean for UK Rail policy?

How about this for a start:

1) More urgency to high speed rail and other rail passenger improvements as an alternative to domestic air travel and car travel (see http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=21574.0 (http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=21574.0))
2) Cuts to long distance rail fares so that they are at least competitive with domestic air travel and cheaper if significantly slower that air travel (taking account of time spent at airports for security check in etc)
3) Promotion of, and incentivisation of use of rail for trunk parcel traffic in place of air


More generally:

4) A long term rolling programme of rail electrification
5) Promotion of rail passenger transport in place of car by provision of good services and integration with other public transport
6) A strategy for transferring most trunk freight traffic to rail

Anyone any other ideas?

A couple of specific points to add to the above.

When planning or carrying out significant civil engineering works on or near the railway, make at least passive provision for considerable capacity enhancements in years to come.

New bridges over rail lines should allow for at least one, and preferably two extra tracks under the new bridge.
New or re-built stations and platforms should allow for future platform extensions to at least 150% of the present train length.

Think twice before building any more 100% diesel trains. We cant electrify the whole network overnight, but with a rolling programme of electrification, the existing fleet of diesel trains should be adequate.
All or almost all new trains to be electric or bi-mode.
To allow for growth, virtually all new trains to be 10 car or longer. I fully appreciate that shorter trains are sufficient for many services, but such needs could be met by cascading EXISTING shorter trains, not building more short units.

As is well known, I don't think much of the IETS, but that is due to the downgraded on board facilities. I have no objection to the PRINCIPLE of bi mode operation.

IMHO all new electric trains should incorporate a small diesel engine, or a battery for use when the wires come down.

The railway industry owns or controls a great deal of property, and should set a good example by generating renewably as much electricity as possible.

Agreed passive provision within reason.


Now that's a bit more than passive provision.  I could design an over-bridge that could be extendable later with another span, but full provision at the start might price many improvements out of existence.


Yes within reason, but that might make finding a site for a new station impossible on some existing lines with the restrictions on curves and gradients nowadays. 


Agreed


Not sure here - might be in danger of pricing these trains out of existence again! However, with some creativity they could be shorter trains that could be reformed into longer trains later. 


Not sure depends on cost implications and future reliability of power supplies. 


Agreed, but how would that be generated?  Probably Solar - would refection for solar collectors near the line cause problems for drivers?

And here is a specific proposal to reduce carbon emissions on the Waterloo to Exeter route, AND improve capacity.
This line is worked by class 158s and 159s, these have many years of useful life left and cant be readily converted to bi-mode operation.

Therefore consider building a small fleet of high powered DC EMUs, with every axle motored and about twice the power per ton of standard designs.
These designed to work in multiple with existing DMUs. On the electrified part of the route, the DMUs are to be hauled "dead" with the new electric unit hauling and powering on board services.
At the limit of the electrified area, the diesel engines are to be started and the electric unit detached.
The ample electricity supply from the conductor rail could pre-heat the diesel engines and fully charge the starter batteries so as to ensure quick and reliable starting.
The total train length should be maximum that Waterloo can handle.
This would give more capacity on the inner part of the route, and would eliminate diesel consumption on the electrified part of the route.
A bit like an updated version of the old REP units.

When the DMUs become life expired, consider replacing them with battery units that are hauled by the EMUs on the electrified part of the route.

All good stuff to allow for increased rail travel. But in the context of "climate emergency," increasing rail travel in itself is a bad thing; it's only a good thing if the travel is journeys that would be made anyway and have been transferred from road or air. So incentives to travel by rail would need to be accompanied by disincentives to other forms of travel and those disincentives would have to be stronger than the incentives; both because of people's habit inertia and because of the extra traffic generated by the cheaper, faster, more convenient train journeys. Even then, it's obviously not as much of a good thing as if those pre-existing journeys were somehow cancelled altogether.

Agree. Rail is one of the best modes of transport WRT carbon emissions, but nothing beats not travelling at all !

Rather than reducing the costs of rail travel, I would prefer to see the costs of road and air travel increased.

And for leisure travel, and for non urgent freight, we should make more use of coastal shipping and of inland waterways.
Canal barges use very little diesel fuel, and could be powered by batteries charged from solar energy.
A return to sail power is a distinct possibility for coastal shipping.

Oh come, this is just absurd.  Even where inland waterways exist (say Bristol to Bath), who's going to spend at least three hours to do a journey that would take 15 minutes by rail (remember all those locks have to be got through). And for freight traffic the slow pace and limited capacity of each barge would mean that labour costs would be astronomical per tonne mile. And of course the current network and capacity of that network would be woefully inadequate for what you suggest.

Presumably you practise what you preach and never make leisure journeys?

The way to make rail more carbon efficient is to cram more seats in, do away with buffets and restaurant cars which are not space efficient, and have shorter sets so that trains aren't carting round lots of empty seats at the extremities of their journeys, and have capacity more tailored to the demand. I'm sure you'll be supportive of this for the greater good.

For leisure journeys, plenty of people already do use inland waterways in various ways. For freight, while the wider network has fallen out of use, a few specific routes do still carry freight. Obviously this only suits freight with long deadlines. The Rhine and Danube are two of the most important freight arteries in Europe.

Yes but people use inland waterways for the pleasure of using them, not for getting from A to B.  And I don't think the cargo carrying capacity of barges that will fit on the Grand Union Canal is quite the same as those that use the Danube or Rhine.

The problem with slow freight is that it increases the amount of working capital a business needs to hold in stock as it is being transported for longer.  That is why express freight is so popular with business.

I get the impression that this is the reason that HST2 has gone back on its (and DfTs?) original promise to retain and enhance existing cycle facilities along its routes.

The discussion over canals surely reflects the reasons for using road freight over rail freight, rail being perceived as slow.

The options for sustainable transport (public transport such as rail and bus) have to be made more attractive compared with the car somehow. Probably a combination reduced price and improved facilities for public transport are as important as increasing the cost and restricting the road spend for cars.

The biggest growth in road use in London is for delivery vans (all those Amazon orders etc.).

For leisure use and short distances active travel has to be encouraged more. Walking and cycling; and possibly horse (I am still thinking of Graham's comment on horses and wonder which transport fund will pay for a hitching rail outside Melksham station)

If this led to a more benign outlook, then I would probably put forward my proposal for a temporary reallocation of Road Investment Strategy funding to pay for a comprehensive rail line/station reopening programme. (http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=20651.msg251499#msg251499) If that benign outlook continued, then I would look at a more permanent reallocation.

For something slightly more left-field, part of what I do is political scenario planning, and whether you are a fan or not, this is increasingly pointing towards a Corbyn-led government. For example, leaving aside the polls for the upcoming European Elections - which by any measure are Brexit Party-dominated - the latest polls for what would happen in a General Election, due to the simultaneous surge in support for both the Brexit Party and the Lib Dems, and a corresponding drop in support for both the Conservatives and Change UK, would see Labour short of a majority by as little as 10 seats, which would certainly make viable a minority Labour government with either Lib Dem or SNP support, or even a formal coalition if they pledged a second referendum on either or both Membership of the EU or Scottish Independence.

Why is this specifically relevant? Well, although it has flown slightly under the radar due to our current Brexit-dominated political agenda, the idea of introducing Universal Basic Income (UBI) (https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/may/12/labour-would-trial-universal-basic-income-if-elected-john-mcdonnell-says) has gained a lot of traction in both Labour and Scottish Government circles, with both seemingly moving closer to endorsing UBI trials as a start point.

However, evidence from other countries has tended to show reluctance to fully roll out UBI after trials have been completed. Therefore, an alternative in the UK context has been put forward in the form of Universal Basic Services (UBS). (https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/igp/sites/bartlett/files/universal_basic_services_-_the_institute_for_global_prosperity_.pdf) This is based on providing universal access to 7 services, free at the point of use, which would be Healthcare, Education, Legal & Democracy, Shelter, Food, Transport and Information.

In terms of Transport, the UBS proposal prices 2 separate options, either universal access to free local bus services only, or universal access to free local bus services, plus local underground, tram, light rail and local train services too.

In terms of paying for the overall UBS package, the proposal advocates reducing the value of the personal allowance for income tax by £7,200, from its 2017-18 value of £11,500 to £4,300. According to the proposal, this would raise around £45bn, almost precisely offsetting the cost of providing the UBS services free at point-of-use.

Whilst most parties would probably baulk at doing this, a Labour government elected on a predominantly left-wing manifesto may well feel that it has been given a mandate to do so.

It would certainly be interesting to see what the effects of introducing either of the proposed UBS Transport options would be in practice.

I see nothing absurd in my suggestion that some leisure travellers could use canals.
The much reduced speed is of little consequence if the journey is considered as part of the holiday or leisure trip rather than simply as a means of getting from one place to another.
Canals are already used for some leisure trips, I was suggesting that such use should be encouraged and expanded.
Virtually all canal boats are diesel powered, but solar looks viable in view of the modest speeds.

I do practice what I preach by not flying or driving, and limiting leisure trips by public transport. And also by minimising my use of fossil fuel at home (no oil central heating, no gas, normally no coal used)

I could not support "greening" trains by use of shorter trains, higher density seating, and removing catering. IMHO trains need to be made MORE comfortable and attractive in other ways, so as to encourage train travel instead of flying or driving.
Trains are unlikely to be as convenient as driving door to door, nor to be as quick as flying. Therefore train travel needs to be made more attractive in other ways, including.
Trains long enough to seat everyone under all but exceptional circumstances.
Comfortable seating with good legroom.
A proper hot buffet on most long distance services, and a full restaurant on selected services where demand exists.

Promote train travel as being more comfortable than flying or driving.

"bacon rolls and fresh coffee served on our trains. we advise against cooking bacon whilst driving"
"enjoy a beer, or something stronger in our buffet and lounge car. We advise against drinking in your car"
"over half our seats are at full size tables, use your laptop in comfort. Please don't use a PC whilst driving"
"catch up on phone calls whilst on board (except in designated areas) You cant do that on a plane"

I have had some lovely holidays on the canals, with only a short journey from home to the starting point, and routes carefully chosen so that the journey, the company and the destination were all a real pleasure.

From Wired (https://www.wired.co.uk/article/trains-planes-emissions-co2-comparison)

A very interesting article looking at the green credentials of various modes but concluding ...

I guess it depends on your definition of a leisure trip.  For example a leisure trip to see your aunt at the seaside, or going shopping for the day, is very unlikely to be a sensible prospect by canal when compared to the car or a train. 

A very small percentage of day out short range leisure trips by canal might be worth doing for the experience, and as a holiday it's a most relaxing way of spending some time.  But of course canal boat hire for holidays is already pretty well established, and if you wanted to increase canal usage many new boats would have to be constructed and places to moor them created on many of the more popular waterways.  Existing canals are often very busy.  You wouldn't get very far if you tried squeezing many more boats up and down the single boat section of the Llangollen Canal near Llangollen for example and the queues would soon build up at Pontcysyllte Aqueduct!

Capacity is also an issue on other routes, especially on canals with lots of locks, and the number of navigable canals is very low still, so there would have to be a lot of money spent on restoration of old canals which could provide a useful tourism and leisure facility, such as the Cromford Canal, to provide more capacity.

I think it should be filed under 'a nice idea in principle'.

Just the sort of thing the EU could, should and is likely to do... ...look forward to the EU forcing UK rail companies to offer through tickets at some time in the future like they forced telecoms companies to abolish roaming charges. Ahh but we are supposed to be leaving aren't we because they force companies to do awful things like this.

Nice to know that the government are taking low carbon travel seriously ! Huge Heathrow expansion plans now published.
Third runway, extra terminals, river to be diverted, M25 to be put into a tunnel under the expanded airport, and other grand plans, to be staged over several decades.

I strongly suspect that a fraction of this money if spent on rail would eliminate the need for extra airport capacity, by transferring many short haul passengers to rail.

Hear, hear

It's called HS2, and it's already looking some way North of £80 billion. How much more money would you like?

The Taxpayers Alliance, no friends of HS2, have published a report on a competition they ran last year to find alternative transport schemes. The winners were:


Given this report's provenance, it is heartening that only three of these are road schemes (A1, A5 and Lower Thames Crossing) and one is even an investment in cycling (Cycle Paths next to Motorways and A-Roads). Note that the scheme for improving connectivity to Bristol Temple Meads is very much from a North Somerset perspective - most people would have called it 'Reopen the Portishead Railway'!

You can read it in full here: https://tinyurl.com/y5bt6y6f

I am afraid there is so much misinformation going round these days (not just about HS2) I cannot take such estimates with any credibility.  It seems to me that when campaigning today it has become perfectly acceptable, if you cannot make you case on anything, just to dream up what you want to say and find some so called journalist who will publish it as fact. Others will then repeat and before long it has become the truth. 

So do you have an authoritative source for this information? 

How about the chap that devised Network Rail's project costing model, commissioned by the DfT? - now there's irony!  :)

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/hs2-high-speed-railway-most-expensive-world-403-million-mile-michael-byng-a7843481.html

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/building-of-hs2-to-cost-403m-a-mile-drzrdzthw

Blimey! Where to start on a thread like this? Here, I think:


It certainly can be done. Travelling to Narita Airport from central Tokyo, the railway was reduced from four to two tracks at some point when plans for a parallel Shinkansen route were dropped. In its place is a 10Km long solar array called, with traditional Japanese romanticism, the SGET Chiba New Town Mega Solar Power Plant, (https://tech.nikkeibp.co.jp/dm/atclen/news_en/15mk/032201220/?ST=msbe) which is quite a sight. Of course, I wouldn't have seen it were I not on my way to catch a plane in Japan, so there go my credentials, although I did go by sea from Dubai. At 12.5MW output, it could actually power a train. Another 270 similar installations would give around the power of Hinkley C when built, at least by day. Japan has a number of other big solar arrays, some not as discreetly positioned.

Why detach them? Why not haul the electrified bits “dead”, with housekeeping power from the DMU? Or why not build a fleet of EMUs with diesel generators that can work it where there is no OHLE?
This is really about buffet cars and hard seats, I reckon!

Tesco tried it. In 2007, they began to transport bulk wine, just arrived in Liverpool from South America, by barge to Manchester to be bottled. There's an article in the Grauniad (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2007/oct/19/carbonemissions.uknews) about it. I would be surprised if it lasted very long, particularly with competition from Australian imports transported by train to Bristol from Tilbury for bottling, but every little helps. The purist, of course, would advocate drinking English wine as a green alternative.
Like grahame, I have enjoyed holidays on canal boats – the fastest way of slowing down! Very enjoyable.

I have also been on a number of cruises on ships of various sizes. Marine oil is very dirty. From crude oil, petrol, diesel, and a few other bits are subtracted at the refinery. The thick goo that is left is marine diesel fuel. I don't know enough about whether the scale of the vessel makes it cleaner overall, but I do know that some passenger ships use ordinary diesel in port, some ports are looking to make them use dockside power, like aircraft often use "ground power" on the floor in aiports, and several cruise lines are looking to LNG as a future fuel. I also know from talking to senior crew that they may have a lot of power at their disposal, but they don't waste it.
They “just in time” economy, where the lorry load of parts arrives just as the fitter needs them. I’m sure adjustments could be made, and speed by canal is remarkably predictable. But there isn’t a convenient canal in Swindon, and soon there won’t be a car factory either.
And another major, and growing, draw from the grid is the internet. Those electrons don’t excite themselves, you know! Bitcoin mining (I don’t know either) now uses more electrical power than 159 countries, including Ireland and most of Africa, use for everything. My  source is here (https://powercompare.co.uk/bitcoin/)
Yes, well. Moving on…
The second longest suicide note in history? It would certainly give the Conservatives some hope, for sure. I think you will find that there is a reason why UBI never got beyond pilot schemes, which is that it didn’t do much beyond enrich the people who got it. It remains a key demand for some small groups. The idea of free transport sounds good, until the true greens who walk everywhere realise that they would be the ones paying for it.

"Oose gonna pay for it?" has long been a battle cry on this electrically-powered forum. That, when extravagant greening promises are made (sometimes by Justine Greening) we need to add "Oose gonna power it?" Politics has become full of ideas to win votes combat the climate emergency, a term that is already beginning to sound as tired as things like "global downturn". We have heard plans to have all vehicles powered by electricity and all heating the same, but nothing to say how we are going to supply the energy, beyond the odd vague mention of a few wind turbines, and storage of the excess power from renewables. I have news - there is no excess power from renewables. We simply turn the gas down at the power stations whenever it is sunny and windy. Which is a good thing, because there is no reliable mass storage. South Korea has been working on this, but has stopped after 23 fires at storage plants - giant collections of batteries to you and me. Add to that the shortages of the metals needed for the batteries and motors that will power our cars, because the Chinese have most of it, and things begin to sound less certain. An electrician was reported in my newspaper (sorry - went out for recycling ) that he was asked to install electric heating and hot water in a development of eight flats somewhere in London, but couldn't, because the supply to the street wasn't up to it. So as well as Hinkley D, E, F, G and H and the long-delayed upgrade to the National Grid, we would need new supplies to every street, and probably 3-phase supply at every house. I haven't seen that on the side of a bus yet.

If I sound a little alarmist, I am not alone. Scotland is known less these days for haggis, kilts, and that furry thing they wear over the todger than for its governments obsession with wind power. Councils refuse them on the grounds that they are blighting the lives of residents outside the cities, spoiling the natural beauty and desecrating ancient burial and historical sites, but the government overrules them. Problem solved? Not quite, according to the report on energy by the Royal Society of Edinburgh (http://www.rse.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/FINAL-ENERGY-INQUIRY-RELEASE-FINAL-1540.docx). Read through it by all means, but the nub of the report is that not enough has been done. Scotland's last two nuclear plants are scheduled for closure around 2030, just as electricity demand begins to rise in response to the other measures being introduced. As demand peaks, around 2040, all the wind turbines currently operating and almost all of those currently being built will be dead. It is written by scientists with no axe to grind, yet it makes for sober reading.

Am I a climate change denier? No. Am I doing anything about it? Yes. My house has an A-rating for energy, and every bulb is LED. The only thing incandescent here is my wife, although she has a bit of a cold just now. And I switch the heating off whenever I go to Japan, South America, Alaska, or wherever, so I'm not such a good boy.

Tricky one.

There'll still be the bodypanel pressing plant for the not-miniature MINIs. I think.

Where to start with addressing a climate emergency!

Some things we can do straight away:
* Take robust action to get better-insulated homes
* Electrify transport - including cars, because they can be charged overnight when there is spare grid capacity.
* Improve public transport, and penalise modes with a heavier carbon footprint once the alternative is in place

The next steps are where it gets tricky: if only we'd gone all-nuclear, like the French did, then we'd have no concerns - other than finding the infinite amount of money needed to look after deadly poison forever. Solar and wind energy are of limited use without high-capacity grid storage, but does that mean we shouldn't install any until we've got that sorted out?

Source: Bristol Post

If WECA were to declare a Climate Emergency, what impact would that have on its road-building schemes?

I'd look at it the other way round: you can declare as urgent a climate emergency as you can find words for but unless it impacts your decisions on roads, power generation, public transport, third runways, etc, it's an empty manifesto.

Most road building schemes would have to be cancelled. More roads means more traffic, largely fossil fueled vehicles, which means more climate change.

The only reasonable exceptions would be minor additions to the secondary road network in order to serve new railway stations or new housing developments, or dedicated bus only roads, preferably trolley busses.
All new homes should have cycle parking spaces, a minimum of one cycle per bedroom, with facilities for charging electric cycles.
All new homes should have at least one charging point for an electric car, multiple charging points for larger homes.
All new homes should be equipped with PV modules, so as to offset the energy used by charging all those electric cars.
All new homes should have a minimum of a 100 amp single phase electricity supply, 3 phase 100 amp for larger homes.

All new, and many existing residential roads should have a 20MPH speed limit so as to make walking and cycling safer.

…..it's also essential in view of the catastrophic effect of cattle on global warming and the environment that GWR take steak off the Pullman menu immediately and that all those with a genuine interest in saving the planet immediately cease eating beef, in order to set an example and avoid any accusations of double standards  ;)

 ;D ;D ;D

Many a true word spoken, I suspect, in jest:

Source: Bristol Post

So maybe it's a bad time to be in the dead cow business. Meanwhile:

Source: MSN

...maybe it's not a good time to be in the live cow business either.

NO.
There are limits. I have however cut back on meat consumption due to the climate changing consequences of cattle production.
I avoid daily consumption of meat.

I've done the first, and taken other measures to reduce my power usage, and agree with the third, including the order in which carrot and stick are applied.

With the second, I would also love for all transport to be electric. But will there still be spare grid capacity at night with 22 million electric cars plugged in, plus every mobile phone, tablet, laptop, anything else with a rechargeable battery? Somehow, I feel we will find that off-peak moves to the middle of the day rather than the night.


Working backwards, I agree that we should do whatever we can to sort things out pending a solution. Solar seems to work fairly well, with the serious drawback of not working at night, but every watt produced by the sun is one less needed from coal or gas. Despite that limitation, there are still plenty of publicly owned rooftops which could be the next step, rather than coating the rest of the countryside with them.

Offshore wind too can help, but again needs to be in the right place. Onshore wind much less so. You can't put wind turbines in cities because lots of people would complain about the noise, the effect on the TV signal and the bits dropping off occasionally, and in any case, there isn't much wind in cities. So they get stuck next to formerly quaint villages in the countryside, with the locals called NIMBYs if they object. They take up a lot of land for what they produce, which is unpredictable. Storage is something of a myth. Even if there was sufficient batteries, we would be storing renewable energy for the sake of it while burning more gas. A bit like putting £100 a month into a savings account at 1% while adding £100 to your credit card bill at 20%, but in carbon terms rather than cash.

Wind turbines are a sign of our problems rather than a solution. The big issue with renewables is the way government incentivises companies. Any money offered is immediately snapped up, with lobbying for more before any work on the current round has even started. Government thinks something is a good idea because a select committee has heard evidence and thinks it's a good idea, this applying even when members of said select committee or family members have interests in the particular technology under discussion. The bigest example of incentive driving perverse behaviour was probably biomass replacing coal in power stations - all very well when using waste wood or plant material, but much less green when it involves shipping kiln-dried pellets of wood from trees specially felled, from Canada and the US. Even the government eventually saw that as bad.

Which leaves nuclear. It doesn't have to be uranium in the reactor. Britain was once at the forefront of research into using thorium as the fuel instead. But we needed plutonium for bombs, and you can't get that from thorium, so our first generation of reactors ran on refined uranium. It decays, and all the bits that fall off hit other bits that fall off until you get a chain reaction, at which time it becomes self-sustaining and generates a lot of heat. Trouble is that left to its own devices, it would run away with itself and melt down, so it has to be moderated. Graphite rods are often used, but if something goes wrong, we are back to the melting scenario.

Thorium is one before uranium in the periodic table, and is a lot more abundant. As a fuel, it doesn't need refinement like uranium. It is less radioactive, and if you put a lot of it in one place, not much will happen. In a reactor, it needs a seed - a small portion of uranium or plutonium, which could come from nuclear waste piles. Then it starts to react like uranium, with some of it actually becoming uranium temporarily. But take the seed element out, and it stops reacting. It can be used as a molten salt - a compound of thorium with something to start it reacting becomes so hot that it melts, and can then be pumped through heat exchangers to proving steam for turbines. But if it overheats, it melts a plug, drains into a pan, and cools down again. In the process, the thorium is consumed, leaving far less radioactive waste, and of a far lower half-life. The current leaders in research are China, India, and Norway. Some reading here (https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2018/08/global-race-for-transformative-molten-salt-nuclear-includes-bill-gates-and-china.html).

A curious fact. Nuclear is seen as dangerous, wind as cuddly. Yet nobody has died in a nuclear accident in Britain in the past decade - probably much longer - but 3 people died in wind power accidents in the same period. It's still a lot safer than coal globally though.

I have just returned from a splendid feast of Beef Wellington at a neighbors.

The beef was produced within a few miles, so that is good from the POV of food miles.
Cattle however are bad from the global warming POV.
I was conveyed to the feast in via a heritage train.
And returned home in a horse drawn cart.

Drink included home made sparkling orange wine, home made beer, and a morsel of port.

So have I sinned, or was this a fairly virtuous night out ?

You sound like a slightly inebriated Jacob Rees-Mogg, or possibly Rowley Birkin QC from The Fast Show. I will allow others to judge whether this constitutes sin or virtue  :)

All that was missing from that night out was the final touch of a smigden of snuff and a tot of tincture. I believe JR-M has admitted it could just be a little bit of addiction..but not enough to worry Nanny otherwise Master Jacob might get a smack(ed) bottom..... ;D

A good text book is Mark Watson's "Crap at the Environment", serialised on Radio 4 many years ago. In it, he tells how, burning with environmental fervour, he resolves to be better at life from an environmental point of view. Sadly, it doesn't always go well. From buying a bicycle ("Do you know how much energy goes into making one? You would walk everywhere if you did") to going to an Al Gore convention in Australia. He pondered the fact that he was eating lunch of New Zealand lamb at Heathrow before boarding the plane to take some of it most of the way back again, and a number of other weighty environmental problems.

A government minister recently manhandled a woman out of a Mansion House dinner because, he said, he thought she might be armed. She replied that “The only thing I was armed with was peer-reviewed science.”

Mark Watson is, as I understand it, a comedian; I expect his book is funny (that's his specialism) but is it good science?


Wind turbines, particularly onshore ones, polarise opinion - to the extent that it is very hard to find clear, unbiased information about their merits and disadvantages. That people don't like them near where they live doesn't mean they don't work, or that onshore 'makes less sense' than offshore - though it may be the case that landowners, keen to pocket the incentives, have been happy to ride roughshod over their neighbours.

No-one is suggesting storing wind turbine energy whilst it could be used directly; the problem is that they often produce, or potentially produce, an excess which can't be used at all. One way that could be stored is in electric car batteries, but a lot of people are working on other ways to store and retrieve it. Under some circumstances it may even make sense to use it to make hydrogen.



It's not that curious though, is it? When a wind turbine goes badly wrong, it may kill people within 500m. When a nuclear power station goes wrong, 2,600km² of countryside becomes uninhabitable for the foreseeable future.

_{Edit: Fixed horrible non-sequitur}

Wind turbines can and do kill people, but not very often and not in large numbers. Nuclear power has the potential for large scale disaster.

Under PRESENT CONDITIONS we do not really need storage of wind power. Gas is being burnt 24/7 for electricity production, and we simply decrease gas use when the wind blows, and increase gas use in calmer weather.

However with the move away from fossil fuel use, the day will come when some electricity in calm weather will HAVE to come from batteries or other storage.
Therefore pilot schemes and trials are underway, well in advance of any urgent need.

I'm not sure if he's funny because I've never heard of him, and this post isn't good science because I can only think of one other example right now (Jonathan Pi), but there does seem to be a trend currently for comedians to write books, make films and otherwise express their opinions on serious subjects and for their comedic opinions to be given as much weight as those of the actual scientists, politicians, etc.

Is John McDonnell a comedian? Last year there were stories about him going round the city trying to persuade them he was just a cuddly Teddy bear wearing a joke-shop Marxist bow tie. They weren't convinced then, and now ... from City A.M. (https://www.cityam.com/city-anger-at-john-mcdonnells-financial-totalitarianism-climate-change-plans/):

I don't doubt it. Many people appear to be having difficulty embracing the width and depth of change that is needed, and the speed with which it needs to be made. No doubt a lot mistakes will be made, red herrings chased and corrupt and wrong-headed things done - that's the nature of human society. Let's just hope that at the end of the process, there is still such a thing as human society.

Meanwhile, elsewhere on these forums, ANOTHER new road scheme has been announced, in order to encourage more people to drive further and faster than before, thereby consuming more fuel and adding to climate change.
Nice to know that the climate change emergency is being taken seriously !

http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=19250.0

Cruising at 50-60mph uses less fuel than stop/starting or crawling due to congestion.

Snipe at the road building by all means but at least offer a practical alternative.

There is a very practical alternative to building roads: don't build roads. No-one is any worse off - the existing routes remain - and the money and resources saved can be redirected towards projects that work towards achieving carbon reduction goals, rather than working against them.

The argument about using less fuel cruising at 60 mi/hr only works if it doesn't occur to anyone else that there is now a quicker and easier way to get from Winterhay Green to the M5; there is plenty of evidence to the contrary.

If it helps, I can tell you that my school run would be an awful lot easier if they'd built the 6-lane motorway that was planned from Montpelier to Clifton; they didn't, and we have to get by on the train or bicycle, on foot or by car on 'unimproved' roads. Funny thing is, when you tell people now about the Bristol Outer Circuit Road plans of the 1970s, their jaws drop in disbelief.

I don't think the mixed messages from the government are helped by things like increasing VAT from 5% to 20% on Solar panels.

This coming after the removal of feed in tariffs further reducing the attractiveness of Solar.

Last I checked they'd also reduced grants and support for Electric cars (although as I think someone mentioned earlier they'd not exactly environmentally friendly in their manufacture)

That's a fine standpoint to take if you live in a conurbation with thousands of jobs/costumers/lots of alternatives to private car and goods vehicle use available, and plenty of other destinations/users and customers to share the cost of a diverse transport offering. And it's wrong!

If however you are in (say) a small Somerset market town that lost its (slow and underused) rail links to the Bristol area in the 1960s, and is not close to a junction on the M5, you are always going to lose if the road network is unimproved. Fare stage buses will take ages to get to the main towns and cities where the best choice of jobs can be found. If you run a business, your products will take longer to get to your customers, and you will have to pay your drivers or haulier for that extra time. Your suppliers will have to spend longer delivering to you, so the choice of supplier will be less and you will be less likely to get a good deal from them. If you are a strategic director of a national retail chain, you are more likely to close a branch in a small town with poor road links where the cost of a delivery vehicle being on the road for longer mitigates against its viability. 

I am all in favour of measures to reduce the impact of transport on the environment (Electrification Now!). But it has to be recognised that there's more to this than simply stopping building roads. It's replacing the fossil fueled vehicles of today with electric vehicles charged by an electric grid run off renewables and nuclear generation that looks likely to be the answer. Condemning communities with poor transport links to ever increasing economic disadvantage is not.

I'll put my soapbox away now.....

Interesting idea, but I believe the 158s/159s already run out of Waterloo in 9/10-car formations, meaning there's little or no capacity benefit. At best, you could reduce the number of units (and therefore cabs) in a 10-car formation by making the EMUs 4-car or 5-car sets. Also, I've not used the route in question myself so I'm quite possibly wrong, but I believe the services currently split at Salisbury, not Basingstoke. Thus, if you dropped the EMU at Basingstoke the trains would actually be shorter between Basingstoke and Salisbury than at present. Assuming the services are currently 9/10-car Waterloo to Salisbury and 3/4-car Salisbury to Exeter I'd suggest a better plan would be to build a fleet of 5-car bi-modes that look similar to the 5-WES units (class 442). That way you get 10-car to Salisbury and 5-car beyond. Cascade the 158s and 159s elsewhere, perhaps to GWR to get the inappropriate Turbos off Cardiff-Portsmouth.

I totally agree with the bit I've put in bold. Behavioural change can involve both 'carrots' and 'sticks' and I imagine it's quite difficult to acheive modal shift while handing out 'carrots' to motorists (I consider projects like the proposed (and hopefully now scrapped for good) second M4 around Newport to be 'carrots').

But that would not be an attractive alternative to the car. Shorter sets have merit if you have unit-end gangways and enough units coupled together at the busy end; in this respect something based on a 153 with lots of splitting and joining to match demand would have been ideal a few decades ago. Now though, society is waking up to the need to cater for the disabled and the shorter each unit is the more extra-large toilets you need. Cabs on new stock are also larger than on a 153. The balance therefore shifts towards slightly longer sets.

I wonder, what is the carbon footprint of a large number of vans, compared to a smaller number of HGVs carrying the same amount of stuff? And if those vans were put onto a motorail train for the common part of the journey? The vans probably weigh more than the HGVs, but unlike HGVs (which might be out of loading gauge) you can put them on a train...

The big things for me though in UK transport policy terms are probably:

• Cap aviation emissions of any greenhouse gas (weighted appropriately for each gas) at their current level or, prefrably, a lower level that decreases every year. Airlines/airports free to re-distribute that budget (eg. cutting 10 short-haul flights to get 1 extra long-haul one) if they wish, but airport expansion would unecessary unless drastic fuel efficientcy improvements come about
• Stop road capacity schemes
• Rolling programme of electrification
  • No more trains / rail vehicles capable of over 110mph to be ordered with diesel engines; plan cascades of existing bi-mode units as electrification progresses (eg. finish wires to Oxford and Bristol, buy EMUs for those routes and cascade 800s to XC)
  • Identify routes which will be last to be electrified, if ever (eg. Heart Of Wales) and ensure that any trains built with diesel capability are suitable for such routes
• Serious effort in making buses an attractive alternative to the car; improve interior quality (eg. legroom), frequencies, journey times (goes hand in hand with the last one, since by running more buses some of them can take shorter routes without leaving villages off the main route without services) and strategies for dealing with disruption (eg. run some routes under contract to a TOC, rather than a local authority, so that passengers are covered by the national rail conditions of travel, particularly the requirement for provision of a hotel/taxi if a missed connection leaves the passenger stranded after the last service of the day). Also, decide on whether hydrogen or batteries is a better approach for buses and role it out (of course, the answer might differ between long-distance routes between key towns (eg. Carmarthen-Aberystwyth) and town service buses)
• More tram schemes

There's probably more that I've forgotten.

This is all about priorities, and we're rapidly running out of time.

From a BBC article quoted by grahame (here: http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=21101.msg268553#msg268553):


Nice idea, but who's gonna pay for it?


£50bn is enough money to put the whole country back on the rail network.

Roughly half of the projected cost of HS2.

As the key routes on the existing network definitely wouldn't be able to cope with the additional passengers generated from the whole country coming back on the rail network, let's have both that £50bn and whatever HS2 ends up costing.  And while we're at it a few more billion on improving trunk routes that won't be alleviated by HS2 would be very useful, such as our own GWML.

Mind you, in reality, I don't think £50bn would be anywhere near enough to get everywhere sensible back on the network, though there are many deserving cases that could be relatively quick wins if the will (and Government policy) was there.

Government?

I was reading about a trial in the US by Amazon where you have a nominated delivery day where all your parcels are delivered on that day. As I work from home on a set day I do try to arrange my deliveries for that day but I still get multiple vans turning up. I haven't been able to find much about it (googling Amazon probably didn't help) but if everything is consolidated into one van then that might help a lot with all the white vans moving around.

And as I think Tony is alluding to not a lot is going to happen at the moment with the government being pretty much focused on a single issue. Lot of lost time and wasted opportunities (assuming the political will was there which I doubt).

I finally got up to speed with this one. Hmm, interesting! LFTR fits in rather well with James Lovelock's idea that the right way to do nuclear power is to put little reactors in the middle of cities; you minimise transmission losses and you can use the waste heat for district heating. Only trouble is, you need to be able to trust everyone in the garrison you station around it to prevent ne'er-do-wells pinching the fuel for whatever reason...

Thorium-fuelled reactors are an interesting topic.

The problem is that the naturally-occurring Thorium 232 isn't fissionable with slow ("thermal") neutrons and, while fissionable by fast neutrons, can't sustain a chain reaction in this way (as far as I can make out).

What this means is that the Thorium 232 has to be converted to fissionable U-233 by "breeding" (in the same way that U-238 can be converted to Plutonium).

This is do-able, but estimates I have seen are that it would take 50+ years for a Thorium-fuelled reactor to breed sufficient fissionable material to start a second reactor. Therefore reactors need uranium to get going.

Usually there's someone on this forum who can check the facts...is there some way around these issues?

Aye, and there's the rub! At best, our energy policy has been decided by uninformed opinion. At worst, it has been formed by pure emotion. Midway between the two, it could have been formed by greed and corruption as people grow rich at the expense of an uninformed public.

As an example, some years ago, an animal activist group complained that chicken cages (I never agreed with caging chickens and am glad the practice ceased) lobbied for the floors of the cages to be made of something thicker than the mesh currently used. The farmers objected because they took less cleaning, but lost, and thick rods were used. Some years later, a university did an experiment where over time, random groups of chickens were given the free choice of either. All chose the mesh.

In similar vein, despite the emotion, advertising, literature and the like, it is just possible that the life cycle of an onshore wind turbine, from the Olympic pool sized bed of concrete and displacement of peat or grassland, the mining and transport of the metals used - neodymium mining is particularly polluting, but mainly in China, so not of any concern to us - to the disposal in landfill of 30 tonnes of non-recyclable slow degrading blades per turbine costs more in environmental terms than it saves. I am not saying it does, nor that other forms of energy production are without similar costs. What I am saying is that in a land full of universities, there has yet to be any unbiased scientific study into the whole overall picture, and there should be. There have no doubt been many peer-reviewed studies into each individual process, or we would still be making town gas from coal.

Onshore wind does polarise opinion. Those who live near them hate them. Those who live out of sight and sound think they are a good idea. I have met many people who, like myself, once thought they are a good idea, but now don't. I have yet to meet anyone who has changed opinion in the opposite direction.


No, and that's the point he makes. None of it has been so far, and it is a subject full of paradox and anomaly. Everyone thinks they have the right answer, but nobody has. He makes no attempt to impose any view, just points out the absurdities of things like having thousands of people flying to conferences to address aviation emissions.

On that last matter, another aside. In my previous career, which I am now sufficiently distanced from to mention occasionally, I once came across what I can only describe as a professional conference attender. He was not a scientist, nor particular articulate in our two meetings, but had become a member of different environmental groups around the country and got himself sent by some of them to different conferences around the world. As a member of the industry, he had spent more than 26 weeks of the previous year abroad. which he described as important work to save the planet. I pointed out that when he had told the Jobcentre he was on a charity holiday in Cornwall, he was in Rio de Janeiro, he was in Kuala Lumpur rather than at a job interview in Manchester, Oslo rather than attending one of the two funerals his father had etc, and would not have got benefit had he told the truth, which he admitted he had known, but given the importance of the work, and so on. The judge didn't take kindly to it either, and arranged for him to be excused looking for work for a period to be able to attend another residential event somewhere less salubrious.

Disclosure: Mark was at school with my son many years ago, and was often at our house, or my son at his, as a youngster. He was, and still is, very bright but showed no sign of being a budding stand-up comic, author (8 books so far), broadcaster and producer. I thought he would make a reasonable accountant or English teacher at that stage.

I think it might be fairer to say "Some of those who live near them hate them".  I do not consider to live near one but I certainly live in sight of one.  I like them. 

Those who oppose them put the argument that the wind does not blow all the time. You could say the same about solar.  However that is what the electricity grid is for - and balancing both solar and wind in different locations makes this much easier.  To assist this there are plenty of schemes for new international grid inter-connectors being put forward.

Those from Europe to the UK are currently on hold as the regulation of them is uncertain due to the UK pulling out of some treaties.  Inter-connectors directly to Ireland are however still being progressed. 

In view of the considerable concerns WRT carbon emissions from air travel, it has been suggested that taking holidays in the UK should be encouraged as an alternative to flying overseas.

Perhaps a start could be made by offering a reliable service of full length trains to West country holiday destinations, EVEN DURING HOT WEATHER when trips to the seaside are particular popular.

Complete with a buffet. Oh sorry, no one wants that.  Complete with a trolley that sells water (or will they top up your own water bottle?)

It's not inconceivable for a trolley (or buffet) to include a barrel of drinking water with a tap for refilling bottles or cups. Whether a small charge would be appropriate for this (because water is not free and the trolley or buffet is a commercial service) is probably a matter for the trolley/buffet operator (but doubtless we can air our opinions here too).

I find cold black tea refreshing on really hot days but I don't think that's a popular beverage so wouldn't expect it to be served on a train!  :D

Drinking water from a water tap is so cheap as to be virtually free, and should not IMHO be charged for.
Metered mains water prices vary a fair bit but are generally less than £5 a cubic meter including sewage disposal.
So a small fraction of a penny to fill a water bottle.

Water on trains is a lot more expensive due to the labour and other costs in handling it and therefore cant realistically be given away.

What could, and should IMO be done is to provide free drinking water fountains and water taps at stations.

Coincidentally,* I went to the tailor's today to pick up some garments that had been altered/mended. I didn't go by train(!), I went on my bike, but the hot weather encouraged me to ride a little bit too hard and I was coughing when I got there - frog in my throat (odd expression!). Having paid and collected, I asked if I could possibly get a glass of water - and I really only wanted a glass of water to clear my throat, but the tailor gave me a small bottle of water from his fridge. But hey, I'd already paid for his work, I guess that covered the cost of a small bottle of no-brand water!

*But perhaps not really that relevantly.

For the Melksham Carnival - on a really hot Saturday 4 weeks ago - we took a very large plastic box filled with ice, several gallon bottles of Spar water from the Spar on Spa Road embedded in it, and paper cups.  Only sensible in this weather for managers / organisers / suppliers to think ahead for staff, customers, and especially volunteers.   Volunteers voted with their feet mouths - a very high proportion of the water drunk.

More plastic bottle news: on closer inspection, the bottle the tailor gave me is from Costco. Comparing it with a bottle of Evian I had at home (empty, relic of an ill-prepared wander in Sea Mills), there is a curious legend on the Evian: "Package not designed for long distance transportation outside Europe." Why on earth not? I mean, it must get transported long distances from the French spring to its retail outlets. Presumably the "outside Europe" is some sort of legal distinction but what? why? Is it that legal advice or requirements inside Europe say it should be transportable or that outside Europe some other hazard has been identified (presumably but not necessarily in the USA)? Or... I don't know. Any ideas?

Off topic really but please forgive me for this ;-

Tour de France halted today through SNOW and snowploughs and bulldozers were unable to clear the route in time.

I would favour cold black beer, and would expect to find it served on a train. Guinness is the brand leader, other dark beers are available, any reasonable quality brand would be fine.

I am curently enjoying the very last 2 pints of Ringwood's Porter, (dark beer) it was transported from place of brewing to home by my own two legs, with the help of a biccycle over 8 miles.

Source: Bristol 247 (https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/bristol-airport-expansion-splits-council-leaders/)

It would be improper for me to advertise my beautiful holiday cottage in Devon  here, even with a substantial discout for forum members. Besides, I'm thinking of putting the rents up to take advantage of the weak pound, and the affordability for your average European citizen. I doubt I will be alone.

Swings and roundabouts.

Well of course if Bristol City Council hadn't sold their stake in the airport, they'd now have a nice little earner to soften the blow (as Manchester, Birmingham and various other local authorities do). Perhaps one of our readers might be able to explain how that happened? Google isn't very informative.

The reality is that, for all the green rhetoric, Bristol is very unlikely to block expansion - there are too many jobs at stake, particularly in south Bristol, which is already fairly economically deprived, but also in tourism and the wider economy. The arena debacle hasn't done Marv many favours, add blocking an airport extension (which would probably be overruled by Westminster anyway), and that would be him properly done for.

Far from Bristol blocking expansion, I thought Bristol, along with South Glos and WECA overall, was in favour of it. It's only North Somerset against it, and they're the ones who get to take the decision. I'm pretty sure they'll go along with their neighbours' wishes. We'll see.

I've seen photos today (taken yesterday I think) of Extinction Rebellion protesters at the DfT with stickers saying "HS2 is our climate emergency". Which is rather ambiguous; does it mean building it contributes to the emergency, perhaps by the carbon emissions from construction work and high speed transport, or that not building it contributes to the emergency, presumably by not shifting transport from road to rail? It seems to be the former, but due to destruction of woodland rather than emissions per se, judging by this at least: http://stophs2.org/tag/extinction-rebellion

Having seen the (largely non biodegradable) mess they left behind in Trafalgar Square and elsewhere, they may care to look a little closer to home.

Whilst I have considerable sympathy for most of the views and concerns of Extinction Rebellion, they are IMHO being increasingly hijacked by a somewhat nutty crowd who oppose almost everything, including HS2, and who join whatever protest is available.

And yes, the amount of non bio-degradable rubbish left behind is most regrettable.

I'm not sure North Somerset is against the expansion, given the business rates they must be raking in. Bath and North East Somerset clearly favour their citizens heading east, to fly from Gatwick or Heathrow. You can take expert reports at face value, but the one underpinning Bristol Airport's expansion plan shows a considerable saving in CO₂ emissions by reducing private travel to get to the aircraft. I found  report in the Post (https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/new-bus-services-bristol-airport-3190222) of planned new bus services to the airport to link Yatton and Nailsea and Backwell stations. I shan't quote it all, but towards the end, a spokesman said (my emphasis):

I remember that minibus, and the later low frequency single-decker, both of which my wife and I had to ourselves on occasion. It is now 6 double deck buses per hour between 6am and 7pm, and 3 bph outside that for much of the rest of the day, with an hourly service from 1.20 to 4.20 am. It has to be about the best served destination by bus in the area, and it is heavily used. If you didn't know, online tickets are £11.00 return, including a bus to and from the airport bus stop in town. I can see  the new services being fairly well used once established.


Hijacked or not, the manifesto I read at the time of the Bristol protests in the summer called for alternatives to domestic flights, and the abolition of the planned alternative. It wasn't the only example of non-joined up thinking.

The Bristol Flyer may be convenient for passengers, but I wonder what public transport options are available for airport workers and flight crew, who presumably don't all live in a straight line between the airport and the city centre, but come from surrounding towns and villager.  Given the huge number of flights that take off between 6 and 8am, how many have a sensible and reliable public transport service that will get them to work for 4am, when all the check in facilities and shops open up? I bet 99% drive.

The Flyer's been a single-decker every time I've used it, but I haven't used it for a few years so it might be double-decker now. Anyway, the increase in bus services to the airport is no surprise given the increase in plane service from it.

As for HS2, I think if it were a case of being given £nbn to do whatever is best for railways, HS2 would not be the answer. But as that's never been the question, that's no reason to scrap it.

They will have more options when the new services open! The exisiting A1 and A2 buses are well used by people who work at the airport, and by crew of aircraft based there. I am guessing they don't pay the full fare, or have a season deal. There was something of a rumpus when it was announced that all airport buses would go via the pointless guided bus route to beef up the numbers, as either many people living around the Chessels area had got jobs at the airport, or many people with jobs at the airport had bought houses at the Chessels. Which shows how employment follows transport. As there is a round-the-clock service, I am sure there are many who drive to work, and some who drive to a bus stop, a bone of contention along many routes.

You couldn't make it up.....https://www.itv.com/news/2019-10-19/shapps-wants-earlier-extinction-of-diesel-trains/

Question and answer I heard the other day ....

"Why does electrification carry on / cost so much less in Scotland than in England"

"Because in Scotland they have a rolling program so that as one line's completed the team moves on to the next, but in England and Wales, the team will be broken up and all move on to new jobs when they reach Cardiff and a new team will need to be built for .... [further projects]"

"Because the lines in England / Wales are for higher speed operation and need more expensive engineering"

At TravelWatch SouthWest yesterday, the question was asked as to why we still have an electric train desert in Devon and Cornwall, especially when electricity might make a significant difference over the banks ... and as I recall, some of those lines are not going to be any faster that the ones they're busy with in Scotland.  If electric trains can reach North Berwick, why can't they reach Falmouth Docks?

It would be absolutely criminal if the current team working on electrifying the line to Cardiff having mastered the skills of electrification were to be broken up.

For me the first priority would be to return to Didcot and electrify the line to Oxford having done extensive work at Oxford to enable electrification to happen to Oxford. Following on from there Chippenham/Bristol Parkway-Bristol Temple Meads.

Electrification must now once again be restored as a number one priority for government. To have trains that can run on electricity continuing to run on diesel for substantial distances on the GWML long into the future to me seems crazy and poor short term thinking from the Dft under the previous Transport Secretary.

To be honest I think Grant’s predecessor was under pressure to react to the huge cost increase and delay to the GWML project and Grant himself (with that scheme virtually finished and starting to be forgotten) is now under pressure to be seen to be more environmentally responsible as that is currently trendy and likely to become trendier.

As ever, actions will speak louder than words.

I'm not sure using those massive structures can really be described as having 'mastered' electrification but other than that I agree with you. Given that the fleet was going to be to some extent bi-mode anyway, there was some logic in postponing the electrification to Bristol and Oxford to allow remodelling to take place first (is that completed at Oxford now?) to avoid having to move recently installed electrification structures. But work on stretches of plain line on Didcot-Oxford and Chippenham - Bristol Temple Meads - Bristol Parkway that are not subject to the remodelling projects should be started as soon as the wires to Cardiff are completed.

Unfortunately a sensible outcome requires joined-up thinking that is very difficult with our fragmented railway system. I feel that new orders for diesel-only trains should be banned immediately, along with bi-modes capable of over 110mph. However, to avoid blocking capacity increases for unelectrified areas (eg. CrossCountry) there needs to be flexibility to move stock between train operators as electrification spreads. Wires to Oxford, Bristol Sheffield and Nottingham could release bi-modes for CrossCountry to use, but there needs to be a way of moving the bi-mode stock before the current lease expires. A well-planned electrification and rolling stock cascade programme is the only way to avoid either scrapping relatively new diesel trains (or at least the powerpacks themselves) after very little use or continuing to use diesel trains beyond the net zero deadline.

Maybe.   But are you condemning unelectified regions such as the South West peninsular and South West Wales to running on a fleet of trains that will become progressively older?  Which are so far from any overhead electrics that their whole local of regional routes have to be covered with self-powered trains?

A very interesting discussion as a small group of us chewed over a barbie yesterday ( the thunderstorms forecast having not appeared ) on the through of using lightweight (almost tramway) electrification for a low cost solution on branches that will always be lower speed.  Windsor, Marlow, Henley-on-Thames, Severn Beach, Exmouth, Gunnislake, Looe, Newquay and St. Ives, perhaps?   Starting (o tackling the issue) from the "other end" of heavy main line stuff. Perhaps short dead sections under bridges with trains coasting, with an emergency battery to cover the odd half mile?

Not very environmentally friendly  ;)

In the Observer (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/oct/20/extinction-rebellion-tube-protest-was-a-mistake) today:

It is a significant issue for many groups to keep / help keep everyone "on message" / on policy, and also for the leaders of such groups - who may be very new to this sort of thing - to make good and brave decisions that turn out to be the right ones.  Good and correct to look back at actions / strategy and to reassess.

Examples ...

1.

Something as simple as a timetable leaflet / line guide that Lisa and I have been composing over the last week. And differences of view as to some of the detail that should go on there, and what the primary intent of the leaflet is.  I think we are there now - there's a proof copy out for people to sign off on, but had we not been careful the headline would have been the green and political correctness agendae rather than "here are you trains and this is where they go" with a strong subtext of "they will work well for you AND you can feel good about using them because they have a better CO2 footprint than your private car alternative".

2.

Nearly 7 years ago (goodness!), Lisa and I appeared on a competitive (reality?) TV show.   At recording, we took personal flack from one of the other pairs appearing to the extent that a third pair jumped in and stood up for us - going far further than we would or could have done.  Then after transmission a small number of people that we know - and some more viewers who we didn't know at all -  got so incensed on our behalf that they also followed up in ways we would not have done.   Some were fine but some were just borderline acceptable, and others (not from people we knew, that goodness) overstepped the mark and were nasty / silly to the extent I'll say "not in my name you don't" - but you can't say that until the damage is done.

3.

There's a particular issue at a organisation I'm with looking to help promote the future development and use of rail routes and travel across the UK.  The official / mainstream approach is to back change that is in well thought out cases, well supported, and has within its case the economics and the effects on others well considered.  The organisation has quite a number of real experts and thinkers who do a sterling job, much of that of necessity behind the scenes.  But there are other have their views - projects which have unanswered elephants in the room so huge they make the whole project look like a joke, projects which rob Peter of £1000 to pay Paul £10, and projects that call for a return of the good old times before Dr Beeching but which really don't add up these days.  You can learn from the doctor, and learn well, but you need a rail system for the future.   The challenge here is to maintain / develop the good name of the organisation through excellence and guide work, with minimal resources, and be able to address any non-aligned publicity from people who associate the ideas they publicise with the organisation, saying "I am a member of" and having it picked up by the recipient of the publicity as "I represent".

A long post ... I look and wonder at the mechanisms at TravelWatch SouthWest, and at how we do things here on the Great Western Coffee Shop, and I look to analyse why such issues are not a frequent concern at either organisation.

GW electrification has turned into an expensive and vote loosing fiasco, but despite this I still a firm believer in electrification, hopefully costs and time frames will improve with experience.
I agree with the suggestion regarding low bridges, that a dead section of "false" overhead should be installed and the train should coast through such short sections.
IMHO, ALL new electric trains should be equipped with limited diesel or battery power for when the wires come down. Sufficient to operate hotel power for a couple of hours, and to proceed at much reduced speed for a few dozen miles.

I do not believe that any more 100% diesel powered passenger trains should be built unless some exceptional need can be demonstrated, that cant be met by existing stock, modified if need be.
It might be decades until some branch lines are electrified, but such lines could use ex main line stock. Old need not mean inferior.
I see no fundamental reason for example why voyagers cant be used for another twenty years on a branch line, having been displaced by new electric units from the routes that they operate at present.
Even IETs might see a second life on a branch line in 25 years time.

At least we didn't cancel any trains because of it  :)

But the so-called end of petrol and diesel cars only means an end to new sales/registrations of purely petrol/diesel vehicles, it actually allows for hybrid vehicles to still be registered beyond that date, including the many "plug in" hybrids which can only manage about 30 miles before they need to use fossil fuels. And of course it only applies to cars (possibly light vans? not sure about motorcycles) not HGVs and buses or anything vaguely approaching the size of a train.

Speaking as the owner of a plug-in hybrid car, I think the best thing you can say about this technology is that it eases the transition for people who have difficulty in embracing new ways of doing things. Our car has an electric motor to propel it around town, and a petrol engine to produce heat - something it's very good at - to demist the windows on days when we forget to pre-heat it from the mains. Newer electric vehicles have more efficient ways to heat the cabin which don't involve burning stuff, so you can get rid of the petrol engine altogether - clever, eh? Not only that, but getting rid of all the combustion plant and peripherals means more room for useful things like passengers and batteries.

In short, I don't think the short-range plug-in hybrid car has much of a future.

As to bi-mode trains: Presuming that a rolling programme of electrification happens, reducing the demand for combustion power, how hard will it be to convert these sets to pure electric? Or are the 5-car sets suitable for secondary routes which may take longer to wire?

Very simple to convert, though the one engine will almost certainly remain as it does on the 'Electric' sets being delivered to LNER to cover for emergencies and depot moves.  Unless by then it can be sensibly replaced by batteries.

People who know more about these things and take more interest in them than I do tell me the main benefit of such cars is a tax break and many never get driven on battery at all. As such, their future is entirely in the chancellor's hands.

I am in favour of bi mode trains (as is well known I don't think much of shorter trains and reduced facilities, but that is "new train disease" rather than being a direct result of bi mode power)

It is a simple matter to remove most of the engines from an IET when a route is electrified. And I doubt that the removed engines will even go to waste. There would probably still be enough diesel running on other routes to use the removed engines as spares.

Bi mode operation gives the option of through running from a hopefully electrified main line onto a lightly used branch.
Existing bi mode trains are IMHO a step forward on environmental grounds, though a backward step for passengers.
Had the present IETs NOT been built, the West would have had a new fleet of 100% diesel trains (shorter and with reduced facilities, remember its new train disease NOT bi-mode disease)
Or we would have had old HSTs still running until at least 2025, whilst new electric units sat in the sidings awaiting the delayed electrification.
Or electrify part of the route and change to a pacer at say Plymouth.

Bi mode also gives the option of diesel power through places like Bath where electrification is opposed. Anyone in Bath who objects to noise or pollution can be told "tough, it is what you wanted"

No, because I used Jo Johnson's weasel words "diesel-only". In other words, diesel engines would only be completely forbiden on new trains that can exceed 110mph. Slower trains could use any of the following solutions:

• diesel-battery hybrid (like the class 230s for Wrexham-Bidston)
• bi-mode diesel-electric (like the class 800s and Anglia FLIRTs)
• bi-mode diesel-battery hybrid (like the class 800s but with batteries as well to reduce diesel consumption on the diesel bits)
• IPEMU (electric with batteries for the unwired bits)
• Hydrogen fuel cell electric multiple unit

If and when either of the last two become practical for all unwired routes then the ban could be extended  to cover diesel engines on all new trains. Northern already have enough diesel-only trains (class 195s) on order to replace the entire class 150/1 fleet if the 195s were released by a new batch of bi-modes in the next franchise, and West Midlands Railway's class 172s and 196s are probably enough to see of most if not all of the class 150/2 units if the Birmingham area gets more electrification to release DMUs.

The 77 additional class 196s (that's what I'm calling them, because the proposals look identical to the West Midlands units) ordered by TfW should be subject to the ban; there is no justification for such a large fleet of new pure diesel trains. A battery-hybrid diesel unit should be much eaiser to convert to bi-mode than a diesel-mechanical multiple unit like the class 196 due to the battery hybrid being driven by electric motors which could get their power from OHLE instead.

It can already be sensibly replaced by batteries, I think. I understand that First Group's order of AT300 units for their East Coast Main Line open access services will have batteries instead of the diesel engine DfT opted for on the class 801 units.

A problem with that is that bridges are often located at or near stations (eg. station footbridges) where the train won't have the speed necessary to coast under the bridge. Something clever has been devised for the Cardiff Intersection Bridge - is that a short dead section or is it live? If it is live, would it be cheaper than bridge reconstructions elsewhere or was it more expensive and only done there because it carries a railway over the railway so would be harder to raise than a bridge carrying a road?

I don't think the engines in the class 800 and class 802 units could be used in any other train for the UK. It may have been 'fake news' of course, but wasn't it claimed that the floors in the class 800/802 are higher than on other units to accomodate the rather large underfloor engines?

In hindsight given the delayed electrification I agree with that, although I'm not sure whether an IC125 from Paddington to Penzance would consume more or less diesel than a class 802 due to the small proportion of that route which is electrified.

However, I feel that once the bi-mode orders for the West Coast and Midland Main Lines are fulfilled there will be no further need of high-speed bi-mode trains. Further bi-mode orders would be for routes such as Cardiff-Portsmouth and most of Wales, which do not require high speeds. The need to replace the class 220/221/222 on CrossCountry in the mid-late 2030s needs to be used as an incentive to electrify the Midland Main Line, Oxford and Bristol in order to release high-speed bi-mode units for cascade to CrossCountry.

This thread has meandered a long way from the opening post, but most of the replies give the sense that the rail industry will continue pretty much as now in the future...no drastic changes in purpose, priorities or timescales.

Perhaps not for some of the outlying branches though:



See https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/dec/01/climate-crisis-leaves-british-coastlines-inches-from-disaster (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/dec/01/climate-crisis-leaves-british-coastlines-inches-from-disaster)

Is "all of Cornwall and half of Devon" an outlying branch line?

My statement about the simplicity of removing engines from bi mode IETs to make them into electric IETs and my assertation that the removed engines "could probably be re-used on other routes that still required diesel power" was not suggesting that these engines could be retrofitted to other types of train.

It should however be possible to re-use the engines on other IETs, as spares. As stated previously, I am in favour of the principle of bi-mode operation and flexible use of electric power when available, without having to electrify throughout.
It is the reduced passenger facilities and comfort to which I object, not the PRINCIPLE of bi mode operation.

I think the suggestion was not that nothing would be done, but that it would be the kind of steady progression we are seeing at the moment with recurring problems (including Dawlish) addressed as the opportunity arises rather than an "OMG" war footing where there is a blitz of preparation.

As for Devon & Cornwall, at least it's getting some rail investment, but a long-term commitment to electrification by 2030 (when the Castles and Sprinters will be well and truly worn out) would not go amiss.   

I think we really do have a problem
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-50516797, as even Jeremy Clarkson is now admiting the climate may be changing..

I am increasingly in favour of electrifying branch lines and secondary routes by use of simpler and cheaper technology than used at present.
750 volts DC OHLE Perhaps. More like tramway overhead and therefore relatively cheap. The equipment used is less obtrusive and this would partially placate the nimbys. Also the relatively modest power demand would reduce the need for expensive grid extensions. DC traction has the merit of being a balanced three phase load, unlike AC which is single phase and therefore disturbing to the rest of the network.
And yes, short dead or neutral sections under bridges or in other problematic locations. The train would normally coast through through such short dead sections but a battery would obviously be required for any unscheduled stop in a dead section.
If one accepts a maximum demand of say 1000 amps at 750  volts, that is of course 750 kilowatts or about 1000 horsepower.
That should be ample for reasonable performance of a 4 car train.
A longer train could be run at reasonable performance by use of a battery to supply say 375 kilowatts in addition to the 750 kilowatts available from the OHLE. This extra power would only be needed briefly, to make a good quick start after a stop.
A 6 car train could then run without any increase in peak power demand over a 4 car unit.
If desired, electric heating and cooling could be automatically disabled when accelerating hard, thus further reducing peak  power demand.

And yes I am well aware that this is a very old thread, but the points raised are still relevant today, arguably more so.