USTDA Grants $1 Million To Support Battery Storage Project In Africa
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Running Africa.
This is the first two paragraphs.
The United States Trade and Development Agency (USTDA), an independent body of the US government, has reportedly issued a grant of just under USD 1 million to support feasibility studies for large-scale battery storage schemes in Senegal and Mozambique.
Notably, these large-scale battery storage projects have been grouped with wind energy in Mozambique in Southeast Africa as well as Senegal in West Africa.
A Dutch company seems to be doing the development.
We need more aid projects like these, as with electricity and clean water life can be so much better!
When Do Mark 2 Coaches Accept The Inevitable?
The title of this post has been chosen for the same reason I used When Do Mark 3 Coaches Accept The Inevitable?
As with the other article, I’m starting with a preamble.
What Is A Mark 2 Coach?
A Mark 2 Coach is the predecessor to the Mark 3 Coach.
The Wikipedia entry for the British Rail Mark 3 Coach , starts with this paragraph.
The Mark 2 family of railway carriages were British Rail’s second design of carriages. They were built by British Rail workshops (from 1969 British Rail Engineering Limited) (BREL) between 1964 and 1975. They were of steel construction
They became the mainstay of the Inter-City fleet and some are still in use today on the Caledonian Sleeper and for charters.
From Inter-City To Mozambique Via New Zealand
This post was brought about by this article on Global Rail News, which is entitled Former British Rail Trains Find New Lease Of Life In Mozambique.
What the title doesn’t say, is that the coaches were originally sold second-hand to New Zealand in the 1990s, where they were re-gauged to three foot six inches. They are now surplus to requirements and are being moved on to Mozambique, where the gauge is the same.
The Wikipedia entry for the New Zealand British Rail Mark 2 Carriage says this about the gauge conversion.
Because of construction constraints, most railway lines in New Zealand have a limited loading gauge. Great Britain uses 1,435 mm (4 ft 8in) standard gauge, but its loading gauge is only slightly larger than New Zealand’s Cape gauge. This means that British Rail rolling stock like the Mark 2 carriage can run on most New Zealand lines after gauge conversion. To fit the New Zealand loading gauge, the Mark 2s were lowered on their new bogies by 25 centimetres.
This is the introduction to the Wikipedia entry for Cape gauge.
Railways with a track gauge of 3 ft 6 in / 1,067 mm were first constructed as horse-drawn wagonways. From the mid-nineteenth century, the 3 ft 6 in gauge became widespread in the British Empire, was known as the Cape Gauge, and was adopted as a standard in Japan and Taiwan.
There are approximately 112,000 kilometres (70,000 mi) of 1,067 mm gauge track in the world, which are classified as narrow gauge railways.
There are quite a lot of raiways with this gauge.
Could modern UK rolling stock be converted to the 1,067 mm narrow gauge?
I suspect the answer is n the affirmative and new British rolling stock like a Bormbardier Aventra or CAF Civity could be adapted to fit the narrow gauge in Australia, New Zealand and large parts of Africa.
The Anonymous Widower 