How might we plan for the sustainability of steam powered heritage rail, while being friendly to the climate?

[Florence Locomotive Works]

41 minutes ago, Wickham Green too said:

I think that's a solution looking for a problem ......... whatever you do you're not going to improve on the efficiency of a straight electric loco.

That is no longer the point.

[J. S. Bach]

Hmmm, Did the title of this thread change? I thought that the original title had something to do with steam in "third world/underdeveloped" countries. Maybe I mis-read it but that is what I was basing my original NO! post on. Tourist lines are such a minimal factor in emissions; world-wide cow farts are probably more serious.

[Nearholmer]

46 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

As for more preserved electric locos / EMUs - that will need to overcome the hostility from the safety lobby who dislike 'amateurs' using stuff above 110V.

There are plenty of retired professionals, just as has been the case with steam, which itself is quite good at killing people of used ignorantly.

 

But, I know what you mean.

Edited September 15, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Florence Locomotive Works]

6 minutes ago, J. S. Bach said:

Hmmm, Did the title of this thread change? I thought that the original title had something to do with steam in "third world/underdeveloped" countries. Maybe I mis-read it but that is what I was basing my original NO! post on. Tourist lines are such a minimal factor in emissions; world-wide cow farts are probably more serious.

Yes I changed the name as we quickly established they won’t be coming back. 

[RJS1977]

1 hour ago, phil-b259 said:

 

The Hydro electric schemes in Wales are actually not there primarily as a power supply!

 

They exist as (1) a fresh water supply for the Wirral / Liverpool and (2) As grid balancing devices which can quickly input large amounts of power to the grid when everyone switches on their kettles after a TV show has finished and the demand suddenly goes up plus consume excess power by pumping water uphill again ready for the next time there is a sudden demand for power.

 

That depends very much which hydro schemes you're referring to.

 

The only two pumped-storage schemes in Wales are Ffestiniog (the one which flooded the old route of the FR) and Dinorwig (next to the Welsh Slate Museum/Llanberis Lake Railway). These are the two 'grid balancing devices'.

 

The remaining hydro stations I'm aware of are Maentwrog, Dolgarrog (built to supply an aluminium works), Cwm Dyli (built to power the Portmadoc, Beddgelert and South Snowdon Railway), and Rheidol - none of which AFAIK have any connection to the water supply to Liverpool/Wirral.

 

The reservoir which (indirectly) supplies Liverpool/Wirral with water is the Tryweryn dam, but this is not a generating dam.

[RJS1977]

36 minutes ago, J. S. Bach said:

 Tourist lines are such a minimal factor in emissions; world-wide cow farts are probably more serious.

 

Indeed, when Joe Biden flies to Glasgow on Air Force One for COP26, that one flight will put more CO2 in the atmosphere than the Talyllyn Railway does in a whole year!

[phil-b259]

40 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

There are plenty of retired professionals, just as has been the case with steam, which itself is quite good at killing people of used ignorantly.

 

 

I don't doubt that. The 'men from the ministry' (or wherever you want to call it these days) on the other hand....

[Nearholmer]

Actually, I wasn't thinking so much of electrifying preserved railways, which has been done to death as a topic here before, more of main-line running, where the infrastructure is NR's problem, and the challenge for a "preserved" item of motive power gets a lot tougher in terms of distance and load to be hauled, which probably takes any currently available stored-energy system out of the equation, whereas it plays to the strengths of a straight electric. Pursuing that line of thinking: if a traction unit can be certified safe for main-line running from a mechanical point of view, achieving the same from electrical point of view ought to be possible. Any diesel-electric has a fair bit of electric in it, after all.

 

A lot would depend, I think, on how truly Edwardian it was, because some locos and EMUs were truly horrendous in terms of lack of protection from exposed circuit conductors, circuit-breaker blast etc for the crew, and some had either winding configurations or control circuity that might cause them to fail EMC compliance. 

 

There are some pretty ancient electric locos used on high days and holidays in Europe of course, and things like the Crocodiles have a solid following among enthusiasts. 

 

Anyway, getting the Brighton Belle back into service is proving challenging enough for those involved, lets see how that turns out.

 

E5001 isn't Edwardian by any means, but it is part of the national collection, and really ought to have as much claim to be kept in main-line condition as any of their steamers. There are two Tyneside locos, and a motor parcel van presrrved as well, aren't there? All "open goals" for low-emmission excursions. I'm rambling (you noticed that), but my point is that there are opportunities for interesting things to happen beyond steam.

 

Edited September 15, 2021 by Nearholmer

[MPR]

Steam locomotives have used many forms of fuel besides oil and coal, including fossil fuels such as turf, LPG and naphtha, but also non fossil fuels such as  wood and bagasse. 
For heritage railway purposes, wood and its derivatives are probably going to provide the best answer for the very long term. There have been a number of experiments with torrefied bio-mass, which is made by a process where wood is heated in an airless environment to produce a coal-like substance. The volatiles that are given off are then burned to sustain the process. Binders are being developed to produce pellets with properties optimised for locomotive fire boxes - the pellets can be stored like coal - they do not absorb moisture.

With all the talk about carbon capture, I also suspect that this process may be a key environmental remediation tool.

The coal mines of the future may be burying this material beneath ground to sequester the carbon.

If we want to maintain some long term access to loco fuel - “we”should be buying and developing commercial forests specifically for this purpose as part of wider carbon sequestration efforts - & be part of the solution and not the problem.

 

 

Edited April 20, 2022 by MPR
spelling

[wombatofludham]

2 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

I was thinking about gas firing, using a ceramic burner, as is done at 16mm/ft, but that, and burning rapeseed waste, still gets us back to CO2. 
 

I wasn't suggesting that rapeseed cake was zero emissions, it's not, but the theory is it sucks CO2 out of the air when growing then when burnt puts it back into the air to be sucked out by further vile smelling yellow flowers in growth.  It takes power of course to process the "biomass" so the carbon balance isn't as clear as advocates suggest.

However, given the amount of CO2 generated by heritage railways is a piddling fart in the wind compared to generators, industry, and Joe and Joanna Numpty whizzing round in their 4x4s, a relatively carbon neutral alternative like waste cattle cake left overs might help the heritage railways even more, and I'm very pleased to see our little railway trying this fuel source, even if they seem to be keeping quiet about it.

Might also explain why the village has had a whiff of cooking the past couple of days (normally I can smell the steam when outside) although that could also be Raj's Indian restaurant or the kebab shop.

[brianthesnail96]

Hydrogen has a lot of potential both for I/C (although it's not exactly flawless- it doesn't ignite under compression so forces you down less efficient combustion strategies) and in fuel cells (also not flawless as they need very "clean" hydrogen and their efficiency is load dependent) but I do wish people would remember that it doesn't grow on trees... The "emissions" are meaningless unless considered alongside the energy cost of actually producing the stuff.

 

Best way to consider it in very simple terms is as as a battery as opposed to as a fuel source in it's own right. 

[Nearholmer]

39 minutes ago, wombatofludham said:

a relatively carbon neutral alternative like waste cattle cake left overs might help the heritage railways even more, and I'm very pleased to see our little railway trying this fuel source,

 

I did understand the advantage, and I agree with your positive view of it, but felt the need to keep knocking home the point that you can't burn carbon-based stuff without creating CO2.

 

I also agree with what you and others have said about heritage railways being a tiny contributor to the problem, but rather like the "thought experiment" nature of a thread that poses the challenge of making them contribute even less to it.

 

The more I think about it, pumped storage hydro, or something similar like storing energy by lifting heavy solid masses, ought to suit a lot of heritage operations, which operate only a few hours each week - store wind or solar M-F, release it SSu ......... of course, I want to release it via a 600V OHL to steeple-cab electric locos, but that isnt really going to cut the mustard with steam-o-holics, is it?

[RJS1977]

One of the big downsides of hydrogen - which doesn't get much attention as everyone is focused on CO2 - is that water vapour is a more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 is!

[GoingUnderground]

11 hours ago, Michael Hodgson said:

Couldn't you just do away with the firebox and replace the coal compartment of the tender with a pantograph to run a great big immersion heater?  You would not have to change engines every 100 miles or so as was necessary using dirty fuel, so you could use the same loco all day - so you'd have to bring back water troughs.

 

Why confine this brilliant idea to the third world?  Is it to promote their tourist industry?

It's already been tried by the Swiss, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric-steam_locomotive

[GoingUnderground]

9 minutes ago, RJS1977 said:

One of the big downsides of hydrogen - which doesn't get much attention as everyone is focused on CO2 - is that water vapour is a more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 is!

And the air is already full of the stuff and the proof is that under certain conditions it partly condenses forming clouds. You know, those big white fluffy or sometimes very dark grey things that float around in the sky above our heads, or occasionally at ground level, which we call fog. And guess what one of the things that all the 7.9 billon humans exhale in their breath is - that's right - water vapour, along with CO2, same as all the other animals that breathe oxygen via lungs.

 

And if global warming continues there's going to be even more water vapour in the air as the warmer the air the more water vapour it can hold. That's why cloudbursts and the resultant localised flooding and landslips and mudslides are becoming more common.

 

But guess what you use to make green hydrogen - WATER. So in a green hydrogen economy you end up with a closed loop system where the only energy input is light falling on photovoltaic cells to produce the electricity to electrolyse water into its component elements, oxygen and hydrogen. And producing hydrogen is a way to store electricity to cope with periods when there's less wind, or when the sun goes out, i.e. at night. And when hydrogen is combined with oxygen from the air in a fuel cell you get the energy in the form of electricity back and the only other product is water, which was the feed stock to make the hydrogen in the first place.

 

But back On Topic, what will heritage steam railways do? I would have thought that the amount of CO2 not to mention the particulates pollution produced by them would not be enough to worry about. But the question is how do you grant exemptions to such undertakings without opening the door to letting others burn coal? And more to the point what will be the price of the coal itself if the volume needed for heritage steam is so small that it is not enough to keep a mine working at its optimum capacity and hence lowest cost to operate? Coal could become very expensive making heritage steam impossible financially.

[DavidB-AU]

1 hour ago, RJS1977 said:

One of the big downsides of hydrogen - which doesn't get much attention as everyone is focused on CO2 - is that water vapour is a more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 is!

 

Zero sum game.

[DavidB-AU]

4 hours ago, J. S. Bach said:

Tourist lines are such a minimal factor in emissions; world-wide cow farts are probably more serious.

 

Technically it's cow burps causing the problems.

[Wickham Green too]

12 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

Yes I changed the name as we quickly established they won’t be coming back. 

Might I suggest you start a new topic next time you want to start a new topic.

[phil-b259]

9 hours ago, DavidB-AU said:

 

Technically it's cow burps causing the problems.

 

Burps or farts - it doesn't really matter! Science tells us we should be eating less meat and more fruit / veg instead - which is fine enough but it would be a lot easier if your broccoli tasted of Bacon or cauliflower tasted of Beef....

[Wickham Green too]

.... and if your broccoli didn't need cow sh1t for fertilizer. ( Or other chemical fertilizers produced with rather more than zero environmental impact.) 

[phil-b259]

19 minutes ago, Wickham Green too said:

.... and if your broccoli didn't need cow sh1t for fertilizer. ( Or other chemical fertilizers produced with rather more than zero environmental impact.) 

 

Technically there is no reason why human sh1t can't replace it*.

 

 

*You just need to make sure its properly treated - in North Korea it isn't and apparently thats why lots of people have tapeworms over there.

[Wickham Green too]

3 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

Technically there is no reason why human sh1t can't replace it.

...... but the political fallout if you suggested it might not be so easy to digest !

[APOLLO]

Whilst we are on about fertilisers and energy resources - todays news

 

https://www.theguardian.com/business/live/2021/sep/16/evergrande-crisis-energy-prices-factories-markets-ftse-dow-us-jobless-business-live?page=with:block-6142f5b18f08762d27632f8a#block-6142f5b18f08762d27632f8a

 

Scroll down to 09:12

 

UK fertiliser plants halt operations amid gas price surge

 

The surge in gas prices has forced a major fertiliser producer to halt operations at two UK plants.

CF Industries Holdings announced late last night that it is halting operations at its manufacturing complexes at Billingham, in County Durham, and Ince (just south of the River Mersey) in Cheshire.

The company, which manufacturers hydrogen and nitrogen products, blamed the move on “high natural gas prices”, adding:

The Company does not have an estimate for when production will resume at the facilities.

It’s a sign that the record rally in gas and power prices is threatening to slow the region’s economic recovery -- with UK steel producers also saying they have paused work due to high prices.

 

Brit15

[phil-b259]

1 hour ago, Wickham Green too said:

...... but the political fallout if you suggested it might not be so easy to digest !

 

Why would anyone feel the need to make a political statement about the type of sh1t we use as fertiliser?

 

Despite the efforts of vegan worriers the UK is not going to stop consuming beef or cow derived dairy products - and nor have scientists advocated such an impossible measure, a simple reduction in consumption per week is all that has been called for.

 

As such animal sh1t is still going to be available - it might just need a bit of human waste to boost volumes.

 

In any case what else are we going to use human sh1t for? Yes it can be dried and burnt for electricity (which produces CO2) or simply buried in landfill (in which case wild plants get the benefit) but neither option is entirely satisfactory for the environment.

[Steven B]

It won't be green issues or lack of skills that kill off preserved steam, it'll be the price of the fuel.

 

Humans have always carried on doing things the old-fashioned way because it's often enjoyable - hence there's plenty of horses and old cars/vans/trucks around when their job of work can be done much more efficiently by today's technology.

 

The bigger problem they're likely to face is the global move away from fossil fuels. The coal mines that are left will become fewer and fewer as demand drops, but I'd guess the price of a ton will rise as a combination of lack of supply and taxes applied to non-environmentally friendly fuel sources. I'd imagine a few well off locomotive owners might convert to burning hydrogen but don't believe we'll see the numbers we have today.

 

Steam engines and first generation diesels have the advantage they use old technology and can usually be fixed with a hammer and a small workshop. As long as the skills are there they can be kept moving. Preserving and keeping moving more modern locomotives and units like the class 66, 67, 68 and 800 will be harder - a higher level skill base and technology will be needed. Compare the number of WW2 aircraft flying to those from the 1960s onwards for example. The higher-tech planes just can't be kept airworthy at a reasonable cost leaving them grounded.

 

Steven B.