Barnaby to led re training for Net Zero
The Net Zero article was indeed very interesting and very thought provoking.
My mind immediately thought of changing “Net Zero” into “Need Trains”. As an ex-farmer I to have learnt many lessons from raising livestock to growing crops. I rapidly learnt that to reap the benefits of all your hard work on a large scale you needed a truck to import farm supplies and to market your pigs, cattle and sheep as well as delivering grain to the silo. My little old small truck rapidly became bigger until I had a prime mover and trailer combination. I was clocking up many miles on the New England Highway both day and night. The truck was even keeping the bank manager happy as I was generating revenue carting other people’s products. I had a run carting rabbits from the chillers in the North West and New England to the casting works at Homebush Abattoirs with the obvious back load to my hometown.
Earlier this week I topped up a modern large high efficiency truck with diesel. I put $990 worth in the right tank and almost the same in the left tank to cover the next day’s work. Two grand a day to keep harassing the cars on the New England Highway makes me think we “Need Trains” and we need them now.
Barnaby, Sam and all the other political leaders need to do some serious modelling and get on board with the majority of those living, visiting and working in the New England and Northern Inland Region who are calling for the reestablishment of a quality passenger and freight rail line from Newcastle to South East Queensland via the cities of Maitland, Tamworth and Armidale.
Whilst rail trails do not have the economic benefits or viability of a sound rail network they are, in fact an extremely harmful distraction.
Importing diesel from overseas to pump it out the exhaust pipes on our highways is not the efficient way to achieve Zero Emission.
Electrify the rail corridor from Newcastle to Tamworth, build a new Ardglen Tunnel and connect the rail line from Armidale to Queensland is the railway to achieve Net Zero in double quick time. And don’t forget to put the batteries in our new regional passenger trains.
Barnaby, the voters of the New England will love you if you can “re train” the regions transport of passengers and freight and led the way to community prosperity with achievable and sustainable emission reduction goals.
Rick Banyard
Warratah West
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Another option is solar powered electric trucks.
Michael Kean road freight is terribly inefficient when compared to rail though. Plus elecric trains can use overhead power, negating the need for batteries which are heavy, expensive, and require time to recharge.
Ashley Baldwin indeed, but trains can’t go to the destination in most cases, so trucks are still needed. You might be able to cut some of the need, but building and maintaining train lines are also an entergy intensive process.
Battery tech will continue to improve.
Ashley Baldwin could you please elaborate on the inefficiencies of road freight in our region.
Jenny Wild rubber tyres rolling on a road create huge energy loss. Energy is also lost by hitting bumps, stopping and starting due to traffic as well as hills. Steel wheels rolling on steel tracks suffer almost zero deformation so rolling resistance is very low thus are extremely efficient per weight moved.
Ashley Baldwin ok so this is an energy issue rather than a productivity concern.
Regional business rely on productive and reliable freight services. Trains can’t deliver those, and never could. There is a bigger picture here than inefficient use of energy, which is, of course a concern. Michael Kean is correct we are seeing major developments in energy efficient vehicles let’s hope that continues.
Trains however will only increase the problems faced with freight movement in general.
Michael Kean small trucks are certainly useful in that local end case, but you don’t need dozens of B-doubles trying to match the capacity of one train.