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Time to electrify... the motorways?

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Nonsense

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I suppose this is something that the long distance bus and coach operators, and private hire, will need to use too.

Wonder if this will lead to increased demand for charter rail operators if 'go anywhere' coaches are not as practical for some journeys.
 

miami

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Why not rails......?????!

Because trucks don't go from the same location to the same location, and unlike road transport, railways depend on massive amounts of infrastructure and manpower to get trains in the right direction. A motorway lane can carry 1000+ containers from felixstowe to 500 different destinations every hour. A railway track can't.

The beauty of this system is that it eliminates the range problem from battery powered lorries. Whether battery capacity will increase enough before this system is viable remains to be seen.

Wonder if this will lead to increased demand for charter rail operators if 'go anywhere' coaches are not as practical for some journeys.

Oh great, rather than a green coach powered by renewable electric, recharging en-route, and battery for the last 20 miles, we get a 50 year old diesel locomotive belching tons of smoke and co2 with a very limited number of destinations it can travel to.
 

Nonsense

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Oh great, rather than a green coach powered by renewable electric, recharging en-route, and battery for the last 20 miles, we get a 50 year old diesel locomotive belching tons of smoke and co2 with a very limited number of destinations it can travel to.
How long will it be before everywhere is within range of the long distance network and spot hire companies have bought electric vehicles?

It might happen quickly, I don't know. What will the range be of an electric coach operating off the grid. If the cables stop at Preston, as seems to be the case from what I've read, could a coach of tourists get to Muncaster, for example? Will it get there with the air conditioning running?

I'm just speculating. My instinct is that battery alone won't cut it, and diesel (or bio diesel maybe) hybrids will be the norm for a while.

If the charter rail industry sees a revival, it needn't be 50 year old diesel. It could just as easily be 30 year bi-mode multiple units.

I suspect we'll see a lot of innovation over the next twenty years, not just in technologies, but in how services and systems are organised.

Fewer commuter journeys where WFH permits. Less door to door freight, replaced by local distribution hubs, to optimise propulsion capabilities of vehicles. The economics of transport are shifting.
 

miami

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How long will it be before everywhere is within range of the long distance network and spot hire companies have bought electric vehicles?

Electric coaches (complete with air con) with a 200 mile range and a 2 hour recharge are already available.

https://pelicanyutong.co.uk/coaches/tce12-electric-coach/

Coaches aren't exactly parked anywhere, they tend to go somewhere for the day then stay there. Relatively trivial to provide electricity to areas coaches can park - compared with keeping personal cars (that are garaged on public roads) charged.

The average age of the 141,000 buses and coaches in UK is 11.2 years, with 66% less than 13 years old, so it won't take anywhere near as long to convert the majority of the UK's coach fleet once the "go" button is pressed. If new diesel coaches were banned today, or made a lot more expensive than new electric coaches, the majority of them would be electric by the time HS2 reaches Crewe.

The local coach firm is running a day out in a few days - only 45 miles to Bakewell. They pick up passengers at a variety of places throughout the town and villages rather than making the (mostly elderly) make their own way several miles to the station. A train excusion, unless it's specifically for the purpose of going to go on a train, is not going to be picking up people in Shavington, nor delivering them to Bakewell -- even if the Buxton-Bakewell line was still open it would take at least 2 hours to go Crewe to Bakewell, assuming paths were available, rather than 1h20 on the coach.

No need for a recharge.

The 70 mile trip to Llandudno likewise is there and back on a single charge.

The 112 mile trip to Grange over Sands would require a recharge at the destination, but I assume the trip is for more than the two hours needed for a full recharge, so it's just a matter of booking in the coach at a charging point at the coach parking at the destination. 200 miles is 4 hours, you're going to have at least one stop on the way. The Scotish excursion after pickups is first stop Tebay, 116 miles. Assuming that's a 45 minute stop, that puts the range back up to 160 miles (at 100 miles per hour). The next stop is Auchentochan distillery with plenty of time for a full charge.

Range and charging time isn't going to decrease over time, and prices aren't going to go up. It seems that electric coaches for the vast majority of excursions from my town are doable with today's technology - even without overhead recharging.

And that's why I think the overhead charging won't work - by the time it's actually rolled out, battery technology will make it unnecessary.
 
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BayPaul

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Electric coaches (complete with air con) with a 200 mile range and a 2 hour recharge are already available.

https://pelicanyutong.co.uk/coaches/tce12-electric-coach/

Coaches aren't exactly parked anywhere, they tend to go somewhere for the day then stay there. Relatively trivial to provide electricity to areas coaches can park - compared with keeping personal cars (that are garaged on public roads) charged.

The average age of the 141,000 buses and coaches in UK is 11.2 years, with 66% less than 13 years old, so it won't take anywhere near as long to convert the majority of the UK's coach fleet once the "go" button is pressed. If new diesel coaches were banned today, or made a lot more expensive than new electric coaches, the majority of them would be electric by the time HS2 reaches Crewe.

The local coach firm is running a day out in a few days - only 45 miles to Bakewell. They pick up passengers at a variety of places throughout the town and villages rather than making the (mostly elderly) make their own way several miles to the station. A train excusion, unless it's specifically for the purpose of going to go on a train, is not going to be picking up people in Shavington, nor delivering them to Bakewell -- even if the Buxton-Bakewell line was still open it would take at least 2 hours to go Crewe to Bakewell, assuming paths were available, rather than 1h20 on the coach.

No need for a recharge.

The 70 mile trip to Llandudno likewise is there and back on a single charge.

The 112 mile trip to Grange over Sands would require a recharge at the destination, but I assume the trip is for more than the two hours needed for a full recharge, so it's just a matter of booking in the coach at a charging point at the coach parking at the destination. 200 miles is 4 hours, you're going to have at least one stop on the way. The Scotish excursion after pickups is first stop Tebay, 116 miles. Assuming that's a 45 minute stop, that puts the range back up to 160 miles (at 100 miles per hour). The next stop is Auchentochan distillery with plenty of time for a full charge.

Range and charging time isn't going to decrease over time, and prices aren't going to go up. It seems that electric coaches for the vast majority of excursions from my town are doable with today's technology - even without overhead recharging.

And that's why I think the overhead charging won't work - by the time it's actually rolled out, battery technology will make it unnecessary.
A great post. It is often assumed that rail will always be greener. Stats like this show how much work is needed to keep rail ahead.
 

LOL The Irony

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I have a brilliant idea. Instead of putting a load of tram lines above the motorways, we, idk, put a little device called a fuel cell in the space where the ICE usually goes. Then to power the fuel cell, we put tanks capable of taking a gas that goes really well wit fuel cells. How about hydrogen? And then, we can fuel it like a regular car, truck or bus, in 5 minutes and not 30.
Electric coaches (complete with air con) with a 200 mile range and a 2 hour recharge are already available.
200 miles range and 2 hour refueling times. I'd love to see you complete the M11 London to Glasgow on that.
 

zwk500

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I have a brilliant idea. Instead of putting a load of tram lines above the motorways, we, idk, put a little device called a fuel cell in the space where the ICE usually goes. Then to power the fuel cell, we put tanks capable of taking a gas that goes really well wit fuel cells. How about hydrogen? And then, we can fuel it like a regular car, truck or bus, in 5 minutes and not 30.
Great idea, except for the fact that it's incredibly flammable and needs a pressurised distribution system that wouldn't be able to just take over petrol stations.
 

Bald Rick

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Isn’t the M11 being referred to the Megabus route London - Glasgow?
 

miami

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200 miles range and 2 hour refueling times. I'd love to see you complete the M11 London to Glasgow on that.

200 miles at the moment. With technology that currently exists. For a tiny minority of coaches.

Long distance coach drivers presumably have to stop for a rest every 200 miles don't they? Doesn't make sense to me to have such journeys anyway, rail is a far better solution to move people that distance.
 

LOL The Irony

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Great idea, except for the fact that it's incredibly flammable and needs a pressurised distribution system that wouldn't be able to just take over petrol stations.
Ever heard about thermal runaway? Also look at the F1 marshals before and after the 2014 engine regulations came into effect and notice what item of clothing they received as a result. Battery electric vehicles are also not infallible.
200 miles at the moment. With technology that currently exists. For a tiny minority of coaches.
We are reaching the limit of what batteries can do and take without going into thermal runaway. We are also having to dig finite resources out of the ground to make batteries, so we just wind up with a supposedly more environmentally friendly fossil fuel problem of it'll run out one day. The next problem is, when we all switch to electric vehicles, how will the national grid cope?
Long distance coach drivers presumably have to stop for a rest every 200 miles don't they? Doesn't make sense to me to have such journeys anyway, rail is a far better solution to move people that distance.
What about tour operators who go all the way to say Amsterdam? So they have to stop for 2 hours every 200 miles. I'd love to be a passenger on that...
Especially as the M11 goes to Cambridge.
There's a single motorway to get from London to Glasgow!? News to me mate. (Thanks for your excellent numbering system Stagecoach!)
 

miami

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London - Amsterdam is only a 300 mile drive if you do Eurotunnel, rather less of you do Harwich - Hook...

Not to mention recharging opportunities in the tunnel (if you're not doing the tunnel then your passengers will be getting off your coach, so why not swap the coach out?)

Don't these coaches tend to stop for refreshment breaks anyway?

For long distance coaches, swapping out batteries would be far more feasible building some sort of hydrogen districution network for a tiny number of journeys required. If battery capacity doesn't keep growing then overhead charging will be reasonable for long distance trips, thus also solving the problem.

Or simply do those journeys on electrified rail.

I do know the fossil fuel lobby is actively trying to slow the inevitability of electric vehicles, it's a shame so many anti-environmentalists are backing them.
 

LOL The Irony

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London - Amsterdam is only a 300 mile drive if you do Eurotunnel, rather less of you do Harwich - Hook...
Which would still require a recharge. Worse still is somewhere further afield such as Manchester or Cardiff. Plus I'm talking about tour companies, not direct coach routes.
Not to mention recharging opportunities in the tunnel
So Eurotunnel have to take power from the trains that could be used for other more useful functions to charge your vehicle?
if you're not doing the tunnel then your passengers will be getting off your coach, so why not swap the coach out?
So companies must now have double the fleet? Oh they're going to love that...
For long distance coaches, swapping out batteries would be far more feasible building some sort of hydrogen districution network for a tiny number of journeys required.
Oh no. There's a reason these are still CGI renderings and don't exist in real life - it's almost impossible to do. You have to have those robotic arms to remove the batteries, lifts capable of taking the weight (both of which have to be made suitable for outdoor use), a way of protecting the batteries, somewhere to store the batteries and a system to ensure you aren't given dud batteries. Then once that is all done, you have to make sure they're properly connected and disconnected, lest you electrify your whole car.
 

Nonsense

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It does seem that there are a lot issues to be ironed out.

I've been in ten hour traffic jams because of accidents. If that happens with a coach, inching along the diversion route for half a day, with cool air blowing on a blazing day, hot air on a freezing day. How far will it get?

I don't think any of these problems are necessarily insurmountable, but there is an assumption that we just need more charging stations are a few battery life imprisonments.
 

Domh245

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I have a brilliant idea. Instead of putting a load of tram lines above the motorways, we, idk, put a little device called a fuel cell in the space where the ICE usually goes. Then to power the fuel cell, we put tanks capable of taking a gas that goes really well wit fuel cells. How about hydrogen? And then, we can fuel it like a regular car, truck or bus, in 5 minutes and not 30.

Fuel cells still require batteries - they struggle to meet the peak outputs whilst remaining even vaguely efficient, so you top up the power output with batteries (plus associated benefit with harvesting under braking)

They also have some rather poor system power densities (J/m3) when you factor in the surprisingly big & heavy tanks necessary for containing hydrogen at the sort of ridiculously high pressures needed. If you're limiting yourself to the same area as the ICE (and fuel tank) then you'll have a rather compromised vehicle

Fuel cells are just a zero-emission (at tailpipe) range extender, rather than a full-on independent motive power source
 

The Ham

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At a guess, there will probably need to be gaps in the OLE above slip roads anyway, so it would presumably be possible to use the outside lanes for an extraordinary load. As others have mentioned, chances are the OLE would be pretty close to overbridge height though, so perhaps not too much of an impact

Current trails have wire hights 5m, UK bridges should have an absolute minimum of 5.03m, however that distance wouldn't allow any resurfacing.

However things get even worse as the guidance also states that any structure which is vulnerable to vehicle impact should be set 5.7m (5.41m minimum assuming no resurfacing) whilst over high load routes the distances are 6.45m/6.18m.

If we maintain the current heights for the wires then every high vehicle will have to use lane 2. Which would be interesting on those roads where there's only two lanes in each direction.

A great post. It is often assumed that rail will always be greener. Stats like this show how much work is needed to keep rail ahead.

Probably not as much your post suggests, for rail passengers rail is already comparable to EV's (per person per km) even though there's a lot of diesel trains still in use.
 

miami

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If we maintain the current heights for the wires then every high vehicle will have to use lane 2. Which would be interesting on those roads where there's only two lanes in each direction.

Why couldn't the wires be 7m above? They don't need to run under bridges as the power is used to recharge.

Probably not as much your post suggests, for rail passengers rail is already comparable to EV's (per person per km) even though there's a lot of diesel trains still in use.

You're comparing a single oocupancy electric car with a heavilly crammed rail service in general. Compare it to the hourly 3 car diesel that passes me with half a dozen passengers on a busy day


A tce12 has 1.4kwh/mile for 50 passengers, so 28 Wh per mile per person.

A Tesla is 34kWh/100 miles, or 340Wh/mile. With 1.4 passengers that's 240Wh per mile per person.

A leaf is about 24kWh/100 miles, so 170Wh/mile per person.

So if the UK rail network as a whole is in the 200Wh/passenger mile range, it needs to get a lot better to reach 28Wh/passenger mile.
 

The Ham

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Why couldn't the wires be 7m above? They don't need to run under bridges as the power is used to recharge.

I'm only quoting the 5m height which is being used in existing trails, it could be that they could be higher, however that would require the lorries using the roads to be able to use the highest level wires.

If the 5m height continues to be used (like those under trails in other locations in Europe) then there's going to be issues if that's the height that they are all installed at and we try setting at a different height.

You're comparing a single oocupancy electric car with a heavilly crammed rail service in general. Compare it to the hourly 3 car diesel that passes me with half a dozen passengers on a busy day

I'm comparing the average car occupancy of 1.2 people per car (as the vast majority of cars are suitable occupancy, but does allow for the few cars which have up to 7 people in) and whilst most passengers do use electric trains the average does take into account the services like those you highlight.

tce12 has 1.4kwh/mile for 50 passengers, so 28 Wh per mile per person.

A Tesla is 34kWh/100 miles, or 340Wh/mile. With 1.4 passengers that's 240Wh per mile per person.

A leaf is about 24kWh/100 miles, so 170Wh/mile per person.

So if the UK rail network as a whole is in the 200Wh/passenger mile range, it needs to get a lot better to reach 28Wh/passenger mile.

Currently there 4,186 million kWh of electricity used, if we assume 60% of the 37bn passenger km traveled by rail is by electric (and it's likely to be quite a bit higher than that) then that's 188wh/passenger.

Whilst there's much more that needs to be done to decarbonise the rail network, that's also true of the road network, with it still being less than 10% of new cars being EV's.

As such the above comparison on just traction emissions is imbalanced, in that we're comparing the best of the cars vs the average of the rail network.

Also if you look at whole life emissions, rail wins out by quite a margin, in part as the emissions in creating batteries is quite significant.

In addition most car users do quite a lot of shorter travel by car rather than walking or cycling, which rail users are more likely to do by those other modes and so the per mile road emissions would likely to be lower still.

Likewise the amount of steel and concrete to ensure that the wires over the motorways are supported from about 1.5m behind the crash barriers across the hard shoulder and to the mid point of the first running lane (something like 7m) is going to take a lot of use before emissions will be reduced from the do nothing option.

To put it into perspective it's likely to need to of a similar size as something which would span two tracks of the rail network and supported from just one side.

Before anyone says that the wire tensions wouldn't need to be as high, the 5.00m height is at the supports, as such the tension would need to be fairly tight to stop there being any sag between supports, or else those clearances would start to reduce further.
 

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They also have some rather poor system power densities (J/m3) when you factor in the surprisingly big & heavy tanks necessary for containing hydrogen at the sort of ridiculously high pressures needed. If you're limiting yourself to the same area as the ICE (and fuel tank) then you'll have a rather compromised vehicle
The Toyota Mirai sticks its biggest tank where the gearbox would normally go in the transmission tunnel, meaning that BEV platforms don't have to be developed alongside ICE platforms at double the expense of just having 1 platform. On buses and coaches, they do/will wind up taking up interior space, but so do CNG and BEV buses, so nothing new there.
Fuel cells are just a zero-emission (at tailpipe) range extender, rather than a full-on independent motive power source
I mean, the ship transporting all those minerals around the world to be turned into batteries is running on what is essentially filtered crude oil, but you won't see Elon or his tech bro fanboys mentioning that. Speaking of a fuel source that could replace the crude oil...
 
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