South Western Railway Completes Trial Of Class 159 Emission Reducing Technology
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Rail Advent.
This is Project 4 called Green Rail Exhaust After Treatment, that I wrote about in Grants To Support Low-Carbon Technology Demonstrators.
I also wrote about the project in SWR And Porterbrook Trial New Emission-Slashing Rail Technology.
This paragraph from the Rail Advent article sums up the results.
In partnership with Porterbrook and Eminox, South Western Railway has trialled a new system that has real-world reductions in pollution from nitrous oxides (NOx) by over 80% and hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide and particulate matter (PM) by over 90%.
The technology appears to have performed well in a six-month trial.
As the proof of the pudding is always in the eating, it will be interesting to see how many systems are installed on the two hundred trains in the closely-related Class 158 and Class 159 train fleets.
The Rival Plans For Piccadilly Station, That Architects Say Will ‘Save Millions’
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on the Manchester Evening News.
This subtitle introduces the idea.
The speculative proposal includes a new underground HS2 station and an ‘s-shaped tunnel’ under the city centre.
The architects are Weston Williamson and I have felt for years that this was the best way and I put my ideas and some fragments from the press and Northern Powerhouse Rail in Manchester Piccadilly ‘Super Hub’ Proposed.
This picture from Weston Williamson, shows their proposed station.
Note.
- In the visualisation, you are observing the station from the East.
- The existing railway lines into Piccadilly station are shown in red.
- Stockport and Manchester Airport are to the left, which is to the South.
- Note the dreaded Castlefield Corridor in red going off into the distance to Oxford Road and Deansgate stations.
- The new high speed lines are shown in blue.
- To the left they go to Manchester Airport and then on to London, Birmingham and the South, Warrington and Liverpool and Wigan, Preston, Blackpool, Barroe-in-Furness, the North and Scotland.
- To the right, they go to Huddersfield, Bradford, Leeds, Hull and the North East, and Sheffield, Doncaster and the East.
- Between it looks like a low-level High Speed station with at least four tracks and six platforms.
- The Manchester Mretrolink is shown in yellow.
- The potential for over-site development is immense. If the Station Square Tower was residential, the penthouses would be some of the most desirable places to live in the North.
This Google Map shows the current station.
Unfortunately, the map is round the other way to the visualisation, but I hope you can see how the shape of the current station is intact and can be picked out in both.
If you’ve ever used London Paddington station in the last few years, you will know that Crossrail is being built underneath. But the massive construction project of building the Crossrail platforms has not inconvenienced the normal business of the station.
Weston Williamson’s proposed station can be built in the same way.
It could be truly transformational
- Manchester Piccadilly station would have at least 43 percent more platforms.
- Classic-compatible High Speed commuter trains would run to Barrow, Blackpool, Chester, Derby, Nottingham and Shrewsbury from the low-level High Speed station.
- The Northern Powerhouse Rail for all TransPennine Express services would use the low-level High Speed station.
- Glasgow services would use the low-level High Speed station.
- Manchester Piccadilly and Manchester Airport would have up to 18 high speed trains per hour and would be the finest airport service in the world.
- Some or all of the low-level High Speed platforms, would be able to take 400 metre long trains.
- 400 metre long platforms could handle one 200 metre long train from Manchester Airport and one 200 metre long train from Yorkshire.
- The Castlefield Corridor would only have local trains, limited to a number, with which it could cope.
- The use of the existing platforms would be reorganised.
It would be a massive increase in the capacity of the station and as been shown at Paddington with Crossrail, I am sure, that it could be built without massive disruption to existing services.
The Ultimate Train To The North
Imagine a pair of 200 metre long classic-compatible trains running between London Euston and Leeds.
- They would travel via Birmingham Interchange, Manchester Airport, Manchester Piccadilly, Huddersfield and Bradford.
- The trains would divide at Leeds.
- One train would go to Hull.
- The second train would go to York, Darlington, Durham and Newcastle. It could be extended to Edinburgh.
- It could even run with a Turn-Up-And-Go frequency of four tph.
Why not?
OVO Energy To Lead Major Zero-Carbon Heat Trial
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Current News.
These initial three paragraphs explain the project.
OVO Energy is to lead one of the UK’s largest ever zero-carbon heating trails, thanks to a £4.2 million grant from the government.
Kaluza, Sunamp, Retrofit Works and Parity Projects will work together with OVO Energy to install and operate zero-carbon heating systems worth up to £15,000 in 250 homes.
Mitusbishi’s Ecodan air source heat pump and Sunamp’s thermal batteries will be installed in the homes, creating electric, zero-carbon heating systems. Additionally, the homes involved will have up to £5,000 worth of energy efficiency improvements made.
That sounds like a sensible project to me, as we need to be zero-carbon in everything we do and heating is the largest source of emissions in the UK with twenty percent.
Think Zinc: Another Metal That Can Transform The Energy Storage Sector
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Stockhouse.
This is the introductory paragraph.
Mines worldwide extract more than 11.9 million metric tons of zinc annually. There are zinc mines in over 50 countries around the world, and while the metal plays a key role in the steel industry, few people understand its transformative role in the energy storage sector. When most people think of the metals that power today’s energy storage systems, vanadium and lithium are at front of mind.
Wikipedia has an entry called Zinc Mining. This extract, sums up the availability of zinc from mining.
Global zinc mine production in 2019 was estimated to be 12.9 million tonnes. The largest producers were China (34%), Peru (11%), Australia (10%), United States (6.1%), India (5.5%), and Mexico (5.4%), with Australia having the largest reserves.
The world’s largest zinc mine is the Red Dog open-pit zinc-lead-silver mine in Alaska, with 4.2% of world production. Major zinc mine operators include Vedanta Resources, Glencore, BHP, Teck Resources, Sumitomo, Nexa Resources, Boliden AB, and China Minmetals.
The paragraph is accompanied by a photograph from the Zinkgruvan mine in Sweden.
Closer to home, in 2009, Ireland mined 385,670 tonnes of zinc and was the tenth largest producer in the world. Tara Mine is at Navan in County Meath.
This Google Map shows its location to the West of Navan.
So if the Irish build more wind turbines, they have the zinc for their own zinc-air batteries.
The Stockhouse article is written by Ron MacDonald, who is President and CEO of Zinc8 Energy Solutions. He says this.
To give one example: Our company Zinc8 Energy Solutions has won a recent contract award and project collaboration with the New York Power Authority (NYPA) and private sector deployment agreement with Digital Energy supported by New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (Nyserda). We will deploy a 100kW/1.5MWh zinc-air system capable of storing energy for 15 hours.
Everybody, who worries about our future energy supplies should read the full article.
The Anonymous Widower 