3 ms·

Train travel may consume less energy than car travel, but it is still energy intensive, so I doubt this makes sense if reducing CO2 emissions is the goal.

Yacoby 4y ago
The goal is to help with the cost of living issues (in part caused by high gas costs) and I think reducing CO2 is secondary. Additionally I suspect trains (at least electric ones) have far less C02 emissions than cars. I'm not sure how electrified Spains rail is.
- Arnt 4y ago
  Your suspicion is correct, under conditions that generally apply. Trains on level ground have extremely low rolling resistance. This means that if you have enough train sets for peak service, running the train sets all day often makes sense, because the additional cost (in terms of CO₂) of operating a train set for an additional hour is so low. It also means that adding passengers to a half-full train is practically free (again, in CO₂).
- belter 4y ago
  "63.7% of the kilometers of railway lines managed by Adif and Adif AV are electrified. In addition, 83% of train-km is done by electric trains." "Spain opts for massive electricity savings by using railway tech" https://www.banenor.no/en/startpage1/News/spain-opts-for-massive-electricity-savings-by-using-railway-tech/ https://www.banenor.no/en/startpage1/News/spain-opts-for-mas... "Percentage of the railway lines in use in Europe in 2019 which were electrified, by country" https://www.statista.com/statistics/451522/share-of-the-rail-network-which-is-electrified-in-europe/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/451522/share-of-the-rail...
- lucb1e 4y ago
  > at least electric ones Diesel trains are better than diesel cars. Carrying a 1000 kg shell for an average of 1.something persons with its own engine and air resistance, and needing to be able to stop in a few hundred meters even at top speed, is less efficient than having one engine and one front side to push air out of the way and low rolling resistance for transporting many people, if you compare equal fuel sources. But then cars are more flexible because you can take your portable shell anywhere at any time, not like the train. Then again, I like train rides (especially the Arriva trains between Sittard and Roermond are super comfy). There's a future for both, I'd say as someone who takes the bus and train at every opportunity (including for daily commute) but still finds himself in a car regularly.
igorkraw 4y ago
On top of what sibling comment said, trains will go anyway, so increasing occupancy means less total carbon since otherwise you'd have train+car. And for some people, this might mean not taking the plane, although I'm unsure about the fraction.
dagurp 4y ago
Do you have any reason to doubt that?
nodja 4y ago
If the train is free people will choose it more often than driving or taking a uber/cab thus saving on CO2 since the train would've been running whether it's full or empty.
- gernb 4y ago
  it has more to do if the trains are nice, clean, safe, on time, plentiful, convenient that price compared to uber
  - smileysteve 4y ago
    India has joined the chatm There are multiple aspects depending on what you're trying to accomplish. Your list is great if the target market is upper middle class (great for voters and private interest groups). Convenient and plentiful are really the ones that matter for economic mobility (person that can't get afford car, gas,insurance)
- severino 4y ago
  On the other hand, if this makes that the trains go full, people already using it may go back to driving or taking a ubar/cab.
  - californical 4y ago
    “Nobody ever goes there anymore, it’s way too crowded!” Really though, how is this an issue? A few people might not use trains anymore because they are packed full of new people? The net result is more people using trains
    - severino 4y ago
      In Spain, public transportation already suffers from many problems. And this can only make it worse, because guess what? The government isn't spending a single cent in improving our network, it's only going to allow people to board for free. And I don't think anybody already using his car will now use the train, because despite being "free" now, it's not going to be better than using your own car. But you're right, I don't think anybody using the train will switch to the car again, because fortunately, this will only last until December. And it won't start until September, because the government didn't want the tourists to benefit from this measure.
toiletfuneral 4y ago
Maybe true but still a bad take. Reducing the surface area of a problem like this makes its much easier to iterate on energy efficiencies than having millions of cars to replace periodically all with variable lifespans
throw827474737 4y ago
The results of Germany's 9€ ticket were profound - where it was more meant socially due to rising fuel prices, it had tremendous impact even on traffic jams, and people that were not expected to switched over. As public transport is usually publicly founded and/or subsidized, it also just makes sense to make it free for the public. Sure, the riches didn't like their Sylt getting invaded by Punks ... but except that I think your fear is unfounded, people don't travel just for fun, except for vacation/recreation, and it is much unfairer if the poor family cannot even do that, while better of people can do anything in their megavan (or to the extreme, in their private jet). Bostonian sounds like Boston ;), is it really so ingrained in the US that everything free or social must be bad? Some kind of mobility is imo kind of basic right, and it wouldn't hurt us richer nations to more support it. (just to make it clear, saying as someone who likely more pays for it than having any use).
- School-Cotton 4y ago
  > is it really so ingrained in the US that everything free or social must be bad? It’s not “the US” as a whole, it’s one particular ideology within the US, but yes, it’s somewhat more common of a view than in Germany.
  - SequoiaHope 4y ago
    One could argue that neoliberalism has been the dominant ideology in the USA for both parties since Ronald Reagan. Democrats and Republicans simply argue about whether the government should do very little or nothing at all. (Unless they are providing protection to big business, and then the government springs in to action.)
    - School-Cotton 4y ago
      According to Wikipedia, the total government budget in the US is around $20k per capita[0] which is on par with some very rich European countries like Germany and France. The problem in the US is extreme waste/inefficiency and unequal access, not lack of spending. By the way, neoliberalism is the dominant ideology in most countries now, not just the US. But neoliberalism doesn’t mean “no state spending”; that would be an exaggerated caricature. What you’re describing is more like libertarianism (in the US sense of the term) which indeed is rather unique to the US, but not the dominant ideology. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_government_budget_per_capita https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_governm...
bertil 4y ago
Train transport is far less, about seven times less, intensive per passenger than cars. Trains allow the production of CO2 to be centralised into a few power plants, owned by a handful of companies that are easy to monitor, regulate, and put around a table to coerce into emission-free solutions. Spain’s electricity carbon intensity is expected to fall from 167 g/kWh in 2020 to 37 g/kWh in 2050 thanks to the exceptional potential of all types of solar and abundant opportunities for wind farms. If you don’t believe me, plot the numbers yourself: train impact will literally be the width of your pen.
standardUser 4y ago
That's an staggeringly ignorant statement. Trains produce less CO2 per passenger mile than virtually any other form of transportation.

Yacoby 4y ago

The goal is to help with the cost of living issues (in part caused by high gas costs) and I think reducing CO2 is secondary. Additionally I suspect trains (at least electric ones) have far less C02 emissions than cars. I'm not sure how electrified Spains rail is.

Arnt 4y ago
Your suspicion is correct, under conditions that generally apply. Trains on level ground have extremely low rolling resistance. This means that if you have enough train sets for peak service, running the train sets all day often makes sense, because the additional cost (in terms of CO₂) of operating a train set for an additional hour is so low. It also means that adding passengers to a half-full train is practically free (again, in CO₂).
belter 4y ago
"63.7% of the kilometers of railway lines managed by Adif and Adif AV are electrified. In addition, 83% of train-km is done by electric trains." "Spain opts for massive electricity savings by using railway tech" https://www.banenor.no/en/startpage1/News/spain-opts-for-massive-electricity-savings-by-using-railway-tech/ https://www.banenor.no/en/startpage1/News/spain-opts-for-mas... "Percentage of the railway lines in use in Europe in 2019 which were electrified, by country" https://www.statista.com/statistics/451522/share-of-the-rail-network-which-is-electrified-in-europe/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/451522/share-of-the-rail...
lucb1e 4y ago
> at least electric ones Diesel trains are better than diesel cars. Carrying a 1000 kg shell for an average of 1.something persons with its own engine and air resistance, and needing to be able to stop in a few hundred meters even at top speed, is less efficient than having one engine and one front side to push air out of the way and low rolling resistance for transporting many people, if you compare equal fuel sources. But then cars are more flexible because you can take your portable shell anywhere at any time, not like the train. Then again, I like train rides (especially the Arriva trains between Sittard and Roermond are super comfy). There's a future for both, I'd say as someone who takes the bus and train at every opportunity (including for daily commute) but still finds himself in a car regularly.

igorkraw 4y ago

On top of what sibling comment said, trains will go anyway, so increasing occupancy means less total carbon since otherwise you'd have train+car. And for some people, this might mean not taking the plane, although I'm unsure about the fraction.

dagurp 4y ago

Do you have any reason to doubt that?

nodja 4y ago

If the train is free people will choose it more often than driving or taking a uber/cab thus saving on CO2 since the train would've been running whether it's full or empty.

gernb 4y ago
it has more to do if the trains are nice, clean, safe, on time, plentiful, convenient that price compared to uber
- smileysteve 4y ago
  India has joined the chatm There are multiple aspects depending on what you're trying to accomplish. Your list is great if the target market is upper middle class (great for voters and private interest groups). Convenient and plentiful are really the ones that matter for economic mobility (person that can't get afford car, gas,insurance)
severino 4y ago
On the other hand, if this makes that the trains go full, people already using it may go back to driving or taking a ubar/cab.
- californical 4y ago
  “Nobody ever goes there anymore, it’s way too crowded!” Really though, how is this an issue? A few people might not use trains anymore because they are packed full of new people? The net result is more people using trains
  - severino 4y ago
    In Spain, public transportation already suffers from many problems. And this can only make it worse, because guess what? The government isn't spending a single cent in improving our network, it's only going to allow people to board for free. And I don't think anybody already using his car will now use the train, because despite being "free" now, it's not going to be better than using your own car. But you're right, I don't think anybody using the train will switch to the car again, because fortunately, this will only last until December. And it won't start until September, because the government didn't want the tourists to benefit from this measure.

toiletfuneral 4y ago

Maybe true but still a bad take. Reducing the surface area of a problem like this makes its much easier to iterate on energy efficiencies than having millions of cars to replace periodically all with variable lifespans

throw827474737 4y ago

The results of Germany's 9€ ticket were profound - where it was more meant socially due to rising fuel prices, it had tremendous impact even on traffic jams, and people that were not expected to switched over. As public transport is usually publicly founded and/or subsidized, it also just makes sense to make it free for the public. Sure, the riches didn't like their Sylt getting invaded by Punks ... but except that I think your fear is unfounded, people don't travel just for fun, except for vacation/recreation, and it is much unfairer if the poor family cannot even do that, while better of people can do anything in their megavan (or to the extreme, in their private jet). Bostonian sounds like Boston ;), is it really so ingrained in the US that everything free or social must be bad? Some kind of mobility is imo kind of basic right, and it wouldn't hurt us richer nations to more support it. (just to make it clear, saying as someone who likely more pays for it than having any use).

School-Cotton 4y ago
> is it really so ingrained in the US that everything free or social must be bad? It’s not “the US” as a whole, it’s one particular ideology within the US, but yes, it’s somewhat more common of a view than in Germany.
- SequoiaHope 4y ago
  One could argue that neoliberalism has been the dominant ideology in the USA for both parties since Ronald Reagan. Democrats and Republicans simply argue about whether the government should do very little or nothing at all. (Unless they are providing protection to big business, and then the government springs in to action.)
  - School-Cotton 4y ago
    According to Wikipedia, the total government budget in the US is around $20k per capita[0] which is on par with some very rich European countries like Germany and France. The problem in the US is extreme waste/inefficiency and unequal access, not lack of spending. By the way, neoliberalism is the dominant ideology in most countries now, not just the US. But neoliberalism doesn’t mean “no state spending”; that would be an exaggerated caricature. What you’re describing is more like libertarianism (in the US sense of the term) which indeed is rather unique to the US, but not the dominant ideology. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_government_budget_per_capita https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_governm...

bertil 4y ago

Train transport is far less, about seven times less, intensive per passenger than cars. Trains allow the production of CO2 to be centralised into a few power plants, owned by a handful of companies that are easy to monitor, regulate, and put around a table to coerce into emission-free solutions. Spain’s electricity carbon intensity is expected to fall from 167 g/kWh in 2020 to 37 g/kWh in 2050 thanks to the exceptional potential of all types of solar and abundant opportunities for wind farms. If you don’t believe me, plot the numbers yourself: train impact will literally be the width of your pen.

standardUser 4y ago

That's an staggeringly ignorant statement. Trains produce less CO2 per passenger mile than virtually any other form of transportation.