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I doubt very much that the marginal external costs of plane travel is lower than train travel! It's possible that the net value is still worth it (depending on
by ravi-delia 3y ago
I doubt very much that the marginal external costs of plane travel is lower than train travel! It's possible that the net value is still worth it (depending on how much people value convenience), but objectively the marginal cost of one more person riding a plane is [externality of flight]/[capacity of flight]. One train trip over the same route has 10x the denominator, and considering that the power comes from the grid not much worse of a numerator, if indeed it is not lower. Does a train really consume that much power?
- themoonisachees 3y agoOops is out of their mind. A train running on 70% nuclear energy from the grid with 90+% efficiency cannot possibly have similar externalities to a plan running on highly transformed fossil fuels. The only way this is even close is if you count the track the train runs on to be dedicated exclusively to that train.
- wyager 3y agoThere are negative externalities beyond the cost of electricity. Installing and maintaining rail, land disruption, wasted human life-hours, etc. all impose internalized and externalized costs.
- ravi-delia 3y agoInstalling and maintaining rail is already priced in, just like the actual market cost of the fuel is for planes. Once all costs are internalized (including land disruption, though the tracks are less negotiable for freight shipping so passenger trips get a free lunch there) wasted life-hours are presumably how people would make the call. But its pretty clear that the marginal, per-person external cost of flying is higher than the marginal per-person external cost of trains.
- ravi-delia 3y agoHoly crap 70% nuclear. Lets go France! There's no shot trains are even close to being as bad as planes.