VIA Rail

[afransen]

Hell the sheer weight of the batteries would probably crush the tracks beneath them.

You know that railways specialize in moving heavy things, right? That's like, their main advantage. The idea of hydrogen being used for freight rail is in its own rail kind of ludicrous. There is no infrastructure for distributing it, fuel cells are very expensive, it costs substantially more than fossil fuels (zero ROI), and they still need batteries for regen braking and peak power to be competitive. Batteries are going to benefit from leverage of the scaling of the road vehicle fleet into BEVs, and rail can ride that cost curve. And there is actually an ROI on replacing diesel with battery electric, one that will only improve.

Hydrogen discussion should probably be kept in the hydrogen economy thread, as it is just fantasy speculation for Via at this point.

 

[roger1818]

You know that railways specialize in moving heavy things, right? That's like, their main advantage.

That is true. The UP Big Boy weighted 600 Tons, though modern freight locomotives only weigh around 210-220 tons. The question is how many tons of Lithium Ion batteries would a freight train need to travel a reasonable distance?

The idea of hydrogen being used for freight rail is in its own rail kind of ludicrous. There is no infrastructure for distributing it,

And there is no infrastructure for charging freight trains, so that point is moot.

fuel cells are very expensive,

As are Lithium-ion batteries (currently about $120 USD per kWh).

it costs substantially more than fossil fuels (zero ROI),

Though the article I previously linked to showed that it is projected to reach cost parody with gasoline by 2025.

and they still need batteries for regen braking and peak power to be competitive.

Much smaller batteries could be used for that purpose.

Batteries are going to benefit from leverage of the scaling of the road vehicle fleet into BEVs, and rail can ride that cost curve. And there is actually an ROI on replacing diesel with battery electric, one that will only improve.

The biggest barrier to cost reduction of batteries is the availability of raw materials. Installing massive batteries in freight locomotives will increase demand for those materials and drive the price up.

Hydrogen discussion should probably be kept in the hydrogen economy thread, as it is just fantasy speculation for Via at this point.

As is the discussion of using batteries for freight trains.

 

[jamincan]

Think about it...........the Tesla SUVs are ILLEGAL on the Brooklyn Bridge because they weigh more than the bridge allows.

This isn't actually quite true. The weight limit of the Brooklyn Bridge is 6000 lbs and the curb weight of a Model X is 5421 lbs. The GVWR does exceed 6000 lbs, but that is true for many other large SUVs and all pickup trucks.

 

[robmausser]

Until electrification of CN happens due to government c02 mandate (because lets be honest it won't happen until that) I'm surprised that the Bombardier Jet Train idea isn't reinvestigated now that we have better battery technology.

The issue with Jet turbines is that they have to run at high RPMs, which is only efficient when you are moving fast. But they are very efficient at high speeds. When a train is idling, or moving slowly, you're burning a whole lot of fuel for nothing.

A hybrid battery solution would solve most of these issues. When the train is moving slowly/idle, shut the jet engine off completely and run everything on battery power. When the train goes above a speed that is ideal for jet power, turn the turbine on and also recharge the batteries at the same time.

A jet engine also weighs 1/10th the weight of a diesel engine of the same power. So the extra weight of batteries would be negligible.

JetTrain - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[kEiThZ]

Fine SFO-YYZ, so what's your alternative to decarbonising the VIA network?

Don't?

There's no mandate that says VIA's network has to be decarbonized. Heck, as it stands our government hasn't even legislated a ban on new ICE vehicle sales. They just have some vague 2040 target for a new ICEV ban. The Conservatives have made no commitment in their plans beyond a 30% of ICEV as ZEV by 2030. But they also cut the carbon price by 60% in their plan. And they are proposing a weaker clean fuels standard than the Liberals today.

So it's just not an issue. Economics, notably the carbon tax, will drive this. And the carbon tax is going to hurt driving and flying far more than trains a long time to come. Heck, even an EV is still barely competitive with a diesel train when you consider per passenger fuel costs. And once you toss in the cost of the car, insurance, parking, etc. it's not competitive. That's why, VIA doesn't need to even consider electrifying any of its fleet till at least 2035.

Realistically, VIA will probably deploy some combination of overhead catenary and battery to electrify the Corridor in the 2030s, once GO is done electrifying corridors that VIA uses. And they'll probably work with CN and CP for biofuels or hydrogen elsewhere.

Ottawa wants to meet net zero by 2050 and that will require a complete decarbonising of our transportation system.

Rail is ~1% of national emissions, with transport as a whole making up ~30% of national emissions. There are far, far bigger fish to fry on this front than worrying about a tiny fraction of that 1% itself. Rail is so efficient that moving passengers from cars and airplanes to diesel trains would be a legitimate emissions reduction strategy.

 

[TerryJohnson]

Modal shift by any means possible is the low hanging fruit of climate policy. Getting people out of cars and planes on to trains, and long-haul freight off the highways on to trains. We could halve Canada's transportation emissions using diesel trains.
The electrification of trains is an incremental bonus on top of that unless we need it to add the capacity and throughput to achieve modal shift.

Industrial emitters will follow the pricing incentives as much as they can, but many gains there are contingent on research and commercialization of new technologies. Home heating is hard to push further because of the long installed life of recently-upgraded high-efficiency gas furnaces and the high price of electricity. Thus transportation is where public policy action, including a fair rail of passengers act and road pricing, can actually make a big difference.

 

[Darwinkgo]

road pricing

The carbon tax is effectively doing that. Even if it doesn't make road pricing advocates happy.

Reality is every path is technology dependent, involves choices with long lived capital stock and large hurdle prices. We don't need government dictating our choices if the carbon price is high enough.

 

[ssiguy2]

Keithz....................so your alternative to diesel trains is to do nothing at all?

Well if Ottawa decides to use that theory then I can't wait for CN & CP to take them to court because one rail system gets a pass and the other doesn't. Ditto for the airlines. If we want a zero emissions economy then it has to apply to all sector and not just Ottawa deciding who should have to follow the rules and who shouldn't. Albertans will certainly have something to say about that.

Let's assume, however, that Ottawa lets VIA keep polluting til the end of time, there is also another reality.........in 30 years VIA won't have any suppliers. The rest of the planet is going green and they are not going to stop doing that just to help little VIA. This is to say nothing of the fact that they also won't have any riders as people completely shun the system due to it being the only transportation system in the country that still belches out emissions.

Whether you, or I, think VIA should go battery, catenary, hydrogen, or horse & buggy is completely irrelevant. The stark reality is that VIA is going to have to move to a completely sustainable and zero emissions fleet and it's not going to come cheap. What's probably worse than the actual price tag is that VIA has absolutely no policy or plans on how they are going to do it but do it they must. This is not a HSR/HFR analogy as those two things can be put off until the end of time but transferring it's entire fleet and the needed infrastructure to support it has a {at maximum} 30 year time table and that's for the entire VIA route system.

 

[Bordercollie]

I don't imagine the battery weight presents any problems as far as the rails themselves are concerned, inasmuch as you could just attach modular battery (or hydrogen) cars, like in the age of steam. I'm just thinking that they're probably looking at the build out of catenary between Edmonton, Calgary, and Winnipeg on the main lines. Maybe in northern Ontario too. My apologies to the other folks for extending this tangent.

You could have battery cars which would recharge from regenerative breaking. It's the equivalent to a DPU on a train, and this way you could connect them to a locomotive or in the back of the train and recharge the batteries.

It would be easier than having small batteries on the freight cars.

 

[Darwinkgo]

^ Kicking the can 5 years down the road is totally viable. CN and CPR will have tested hydrogen enough to be able to run modeling. Batteries + catenary will also have more experience, as will the dedicated electric freight corridors in India.

Lots of pieces moving at the same time. Almost no benefit of moving today. Waiting is totally viable.

 

[nfitz]

Keithz....................so your alternative to diesel trains is to do nothing at all?

Well if Ottawa decides to use that theory then I can't wait for CN & CP to take them to court because one rail system gets a pass and the other doesn't.

The use of diesel for long-haul freight and passengers is hardly low-hanging fruit. The reduction in carbon emissions compared to trucks and cars is massive.

There's little point in worrying about this, this decade. Canada isn't on the cutting edge here - by the time we need to be making decisions on this, we'll see a much clearer path forward from other jurisdictions. Who knows, by the time this really becomes pressing, VIA Rail may not even exist. And if it does, it might not even have coast-to-coast service.

 

[EnviroTO]

Trains already drastically reduce carbon emissions and the engines get cleaner all the time. This video (focusing on the double stack train in the first 8 minutes and 12 seconds of the video) is mind boggling when you see the train stretch as far as the eye can see from a high vantage point and realize every container is a truck off the roads. I have to believe that equally applied carbon tax favours the most efficient mode and trains are it.

 

[roger1818]

Trains already drastically reduce carbon emissions and the engines get cleaner all the time. This video (focusing on the double stack train in the first 8 minutes and 12 seconds of the video) is mind boggling when you see the train stretch as far as the eye can see from a high vantage point and realize every container is a truck off the roads. I have to believe that equally applied carbon tax favours the most efficient mode and trains are it.

I would wager that that one train (even powered by fossil fuels) reduces more CO2 by getting trucks off the road than VIA rail could ever do (even if electrified) in a year by getting cars off the road. Many people on here see the freight railways as the enemy, but in reality they are our friends.

 

[UrbanJon]

I found this paper and thought it was worth a share.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/cag.12649

Of note:

It is commonly assumed that taking the train serves as a more climate ‐ friendly means of travel than flying by commercial aircraft. Nevertheless, in Canada, long ‐ distance rail services are powered by aging and inefficient diesel locomotives. Moreover, long ‐ haul passenger trains are not typically loaded to capacity, and they must travel longer distances than equivalent air routes (which are able to benefit from more direct flight paths). This viewpoint considers whether traveling long ‐ distance by train generates a larger climatic footprint than flying by commercial aircraft, and offers a basic carbon footprint analysis and modal comparison of three long ‐ distance routes in Canada. It finds that taking the train does indeed generate a larger climatic impact than flying, in the cases of VIA Rail '2 warming impact into account.

Unfortunately, the climate savings of rail are not absolute, especially for long distance passengers and with the climate crisis we are in, it may be best to cancel the Canadian outright.

 

[Bordercollie]

I found this paper and thought it was worth a share.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/cag.12649

Of note:

Unfortunately, the climate savings of rail are not absolute, especially for long distance passengers and with the climate crisis we are in, it may be best to cancel the Canadian outright.

That's only if you think of the carbon emissions from Toronto to Vancouver. What about between travelling in-between those two locations? What about remote locations that dont have airports?

Everyone doesn't live in a major metropolitan area.

And the carbon emissions for a single driver in a car Driving from Toronto to Edmonton is going to be more than taking the Canadian.