RAILWAY SAMACHAR

Railways to pitch green technology on global scale

The city’s new trains are hoping to make a global mark.

The country has officially taken up the state-of-the-art green technology used in them as a project to be included in the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) of the United Nations Framework Climate Change Convention.

The railways hope the power-saving new trains on the western grid will serve as a global model. Railway officials have described the city’s new local trains as low-greenhouse gas emitting vehicles (LGHG) for reducing carbon emissions and saving power from the western power grid of the country.

Indian Railways will make the case for India to the designated national authority, the National Clean Development Mechanism Authority.

The railways believe the new trains are India’s contribution to sustainable development and the technology can be replicated globally. “The new trains are power generators and reuse 30 per cent of energy while acceleration and deceleration,” a senior railway official of the railway ministry said. “The entire suburban train fleet in Mumbai will be
replaced with these trains.”

The project document says India is an importer of fossil fuels, which are required to generate electricity.

“The savings by these trains will save power from the country’s western grid and cut down 5.2 lakh tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions (per year) that would have been generated, lowering its dependence on fossil fuels as the saved energy could be used elsewhere,” the document says.

The CDM allows emission-reduction (or emission removal) projects in developing countries to earn certified emission reduction (CER) credits, each equivalent to one tonne of CO2. These CERs can be traded and sold, and used by industrialised countries to a meet a part of their emission reduction targets under the Kyoto Protocol.

The regenerative braking in the new train generates about 30 pc of power. The regenerated electrical energy can be reused and goes back into the system and is used by other trains on the same service line. This leads to reduction of power consumption.

Less power is drawn from the western electric grid, thereby conserving electricity and reducing green house gases.