First off, Diesel Busses Are equally environmental friendly as electric trains. (On long distance trips) this is due to infrastructure emissions, which are far higher for train infrastructure.
Furthermore looking at batteries: Batteries are expensive and very sensible to temperatures. They are virtually unusable in some climate zones. Furthermore a battery burns much hotter than gasoline. Much much hotter. So hot in fact that the damage to roads is immense.
In addition to that, battery driven cars and buses are extremely heavy and damaging asphalt infrastructure as well.
The best solution is to shift mobility towards Diesel driven Busses and facilitate car sharing.
It’s flexible, mich more flexible than other solutions. This makes it adaptable to many environments and situations.
And it does not force people to give up achievements of mobility.
The example in the meme is extra problematic, because steel cables and train infrastructure is heavily reliant on coal. And replacement of coal with hydrogen is not to be seen in the foreseeable future.
What sort of “infrastructure emissions”? That doesn’t really make sense to me, once you build the infrastructure it already exists, so it doesn’t just emit on its own. Also rail infrastructure being worse than road infrastructure doesn’t makes sense. Electric trains have extremely negligible emissions (I dare say practically none in normal operation). Electric road vehicles (of any type) still have tyre emissions (and make them worse because they are heavier). Electric trains are over all the best way forward dice intercity transport.
What sort of “infrastructure emissions”? That doesn’t really make sense to me, once you build the infrastructure it already exists, so it doesn’t just emit on its own.
Let me rephrase it: infrastructure maintaining emissions.
You have to think about all the people involved in organising train infrastructure each day. It’s immense.
I can’t find the source anymore. But a german agency once published a calculation, that on a 100 km trip, the train was still emitting less, including every emissions connected to this one train ride. But the difference to a diesel Bus became basically unmentionable. Just a few kg CO2 more. But not much.
And keep in mind that a bus is much more flexible than a train.
Also rail infrastructure being worse than road infrastructure doesn’t makes sense. Electric trains have extremely negligible emissions (I dare say practically none in normal operation). Electric road vehicles (of any type) still have tyre emissions (and make them worse because they are heavier). Electric trains are over all the best way forward dice intercity transport.
Not quite. As every city is dependant on road infrastructure. It starts with the building of houses and the transport of material. You cannot use rail infrastructure for every house. It does not bring the needed flexibility. Same goes for emergency services, police, firebricks, ambulance, craftsman,… asphalt based infrastructure is irreplaceable. Might as well use it for public transport instead of creating a second infrastructure to care for.
One little new building project and a rail route in a city is blocked for 1-2 years. Car infrastructure is flexible and can evade this problem.
This seems too unbelievable for me to take your word for it. Find the source or stop spouting nonsense.
Repairing asphalt roads causes a huge amount of emissions, and the more traffic those roads see, the more often they need to be replaced.
In what world does maintaining a rail line even come close to the emissions produced by maintaining buses, trucks, and the road itself?
Asphalt is a byproduct of oil refinery. It’s literal main component is production waste. There is a ton of it.
Steel on the other hand must be produced in the so called blast furnace process. It’s the reduction of iron oxide with carbon monoxide and hydrogen gas. But the hydrogen is it added separately. It’s a byproduct of the process that reacts as well reductive towards iron oxide.
You need to burn immense amounts of coal to create elemental iron.
And trails are equally time consuming and resources consuming with maintenance as asphalt streets are.
I don’t know what kind of source you want there. Do you need a link towards Wikipedia? Or can you find the production of iron and asphalt yourself?
The article you linked makes no mention of maintenance and infrastructure emissions. There’s just a single table that seems to be based on fuel emissions at the time of travel. It’s also specific to existing rail infrastructure, which is fine, but for the purposes of argument and comparison, it would be ideal to compare the most efficient bus/roadway system with the most efficient rail system. Zero-emissions trains exist, yet somehow just maintaining the rail line would completely offset that according to your argument?
Asphalt is an oil product, yes, but it still needs to be processed and turned into asphalt. That also emits pollution. So does transporting it to the destination, and all the other environmental factors with building up a road surface. You can’t just hand wave that away “because we already made a ton of it”. That’s not how sustainability works. We’re explicitly trying to reduce our reliance on oil.
You also seem to be ignoring that rail lasts orders of magnitude longer than asphalt, and don’t constantly have to be patched and repaired for pot holes.
Steel is also one of the most recycled materials on the planet. (Nearly 70% of all steel here in the US is recycled). Melting down old cars or whatever into new rail tracks uses significantly less energy than refining new metal.
When the argument is emergency vehicles and “rail infrastructure for every house” it is clear that you are talking with an American that has no idea what they are talking about
You are talking with a European. A German in fact.
And I was not talking about rail to every house, I was mentioning the absolute necessity for asphalt streets. And that this infrastructure is far more flexible and adaptive than all the alternatives. Something irreplaceable in fact.
Modern OHLE standards are significantly less messy than they were 100 years ago. And if they really are still that bad, conductor rails work almost as well.
OHLE is a conductor too. The issue with conductor rials is that they use DC rather than AC, which means that voltage is lower, meaning substations need to be more frequent. However, the conductor rail takes up no additional space in the loading gauge compared to OHLE, so for underground systems, or systems that need minimal clearance, conductor rails are better.
“Conductors” as in any piece of metal that conducts electricity? Those overhead wires are also conductors, and will see some energy loss over their length like any other conductor.
The whole thing about trolleybuses is that they don’t pollute inside of the city. Obviously that pollution still happens somewhere, but it isn’t under your nose.
I hate to see misinformation being spread.
First off, Diesel Busses Are equally environmental friendly as electric trains. (On long distance trips) this is due to infrastructure emissions, which are far higher for train infrastructure.
Furthermore looking at batteries: Batteries are expensive and very sensible to temperatures. They are virtually unusable in some climate zones. Furthermore a battery burns much hotter than gasoline. Much much hotter. So hot in fact that the damage to roads is immense. In addition to that, battery driven cars and buses are extremely heavy and damaging asphalt infrastructure as well.
The best solution is to shift mobility towards Diesel driven Busses and facilitate car sharing. It’s flexible, mich more flexible than other solutions. This makes it adaptable to many environments and situations. And it does not force people to give up achievements of mobility.
The example in the meme is extra problematic, because steel cables and train infrastructure is heavily reliant on coal. And replacement of coal with hydrogen is not to be seen in the foreseeable future.
What sort of “infrastructure emissions”? That doesn’t really make sense to me, once you build the infrastructure it already exists, so it doesn’t just emit on its own. Also rail infrastructure being worse than road infrastructure doesn’t makes sense. Electric trains have extremely negligible emissions (I dare say practically none in normal operation). Electric road vehicles (of any type) still have tyre emissions (and make them worse because they are heavier). Electric trains are over all the best way forward dice intercity transport.
And those emissions that exist happen outside of the city
Let me rephrase it: infrastructure maintaining emissions. You have to think about all the people involved in organising train infrastructure each day. It’s immense. I can’t find the source anymore. But a german agency once published a calculation, that on a 100 km trip, the train was still emitting less, including every emissions connected to this one train ride. But the difference to a diesel Bus became basically unmentionable. Just a few kg CO2 more. But not much. And keep in mind that a bus is much more flexible than a train.
Not quite. As every city is dependant on road infrastructure. It starts with the building of houses and the transport of material. You cannot use rail infrastructure for every house. It does not bring the needed flexibility. Same goes for emergency services, police, firebricks, ambulance, craftsman,… asphalt based infrastructure is irreplaceable. Might as well use it for public transport instead of creating a second infrastructure to care for. One little new building project and a rail route in a city is blocked for 1-2 years. Car infrastructure is flexible and can evade this problem.
This seems too unbelievable for me to take your word for it. Find the source or stop spouting nonsense.
Repairing asphalt roads causes a huge amount of emissions, and the more traffic those roads see, the more often they need to be replaced.
In what world does maintaining a rail line even come close to the emissions produced by maintaining buses, trucks, and the road itself?
Asphalt is a byproduct of oil refinery. It’s literal main component is production waste. There is a ton of it.
Steel on the other hand must be produced in the so called blast furnace process. It’s the reduction of iron oxide with carbon monoxide and hydrogen gas. But the hydrogen is it added separately. It’s a byproduct of the process that reacts as well reductive towards iron oxide. You need to burn immense amounts of coal to create elemental iron.
And trails are equally time consuming and resources consuming with maintenance as asphalt streets are.
I don’t know what kind of source you want there. Do you need a link towards Wikipedia? Or can you find the production of iron and asphalt yourself?
For sure a car cannot compete with a trains emissions. But a diesel driven bus can. Here is a source. You might need a translator. It’s a German article. link to a german news agency. citing a study by the Umweltministerium (ministry for Environment)
I am in fact not spouting nonsense. I am merely stating the truth.
The article you linked makes no mention of maintenance and infrastructure emissions. There’s just a single table that seems to be based on fuel emissions at the time of travel. It’s also specific to existing rail infrastructure, which is fine, but for the purposes of argument and comparison, it would be ideal to compare the most efficient bus/roadway system with the most efficient rail system. Zero-emissions trains exist, yet somehow just maintaining the rail line would completely offset that according to your argument?
Asphalt is an oil product, yes, but it still needs to be processed and turned into asphalt. That also emits pollution. So does transporting it to the destination, and all the other environmental factors with building up a road surface. You can’t just hand wave that away “because we already made a ton of it”. That’s not how sustainability works. We’re explicitly trying to reduce our reliance on oil.
You also seem to be ignoring that rail lasts orders of magnitude longer than asphalt, and don’t constantly have to be patched and repaired for pot holes. Steel is also one of the most recycled materials on the planet. (Nearly 70% of all steel here in the US is recycled). Melting down old cars or whatever into new rail tracks uses significantly less energy than refining new metal.
When the argument is emergency vehicles and “rail infrastructure for every house” it is clear that you are talking with an American that has no idea what they are talking about
You are talking with a European. A German in fact.
And I was not talking about rail to every house, I was mentioning the absolute necessity for asphalt streets. And that this infrastructure is far more flexible and adaptive than all the alternatives. Something irreplaceable in fact.
Also overhead wires are hideous
Modern OHLE standards are significantly less messy than they were 100 years ago. And if they really are still that bad, conductor rails work almost as well.
Conductors are always connected to energy loss. I don’t mind the cables. They are not looking good, but I can live with them.
OHLE is a conductor too. The issue with conductor rials is that they use DC rather than AC, which means that voltage is lower, meaning substations need to be more frequent. However, the conductor rail takes up no additional space in the loading gauge compared to OHLE, so for underground systems, or systems that need minimal clearance, conductor rails are better.
“Conductors” as in any piece of metal that conducts electricity? Those overhead wires are also conductors, and will see some energy loss over their length like any other conductor.
The whole thing about trolleybuses is that they don’t pollute inside of the city. Obviously that pollution still happens somewhere, but it isn’t under your nose.