From the Guardian via Treehugger and AutoBlog Green we learn that EuroStar — the train service that operates between London and Paris through the English Channel tunnel — aims to become completely carbon neutral. Billing itself as already ten times less polluting than air travel on the same route, they plan to reduce their carbon emissions by twenty five percent by 2012 by purchasing greener electricity for their trains, making the trains more efficient and improving their capacity utilization. “On top of that after November 2007 they will buy carbon offsets for all the emissions they can’t eliminate.”
This announcement comes after two other related rail announcements:
- French bullet train set a new speed record
- Recent resurgence of a proposal to build a Bering Strait tunnel between Alaska and Russia for oil, gas and rail transport.
And, now the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) Working Group 3 summary report on mitigation of climate change is out. It will be interesting how the United States responds to one of the recommendations.
No, not the energy efficiency one… one can quite imagine that there will be considerable debate, delay and false promises regarding increased automobile efficiency. Rather, it is the Road to Rail recommendation that piques this blog’s interest. It is my understanding that in the United States it is a very forbidden federal policy topic.
Um, if anyone knows where the Douglas Adams simulacrum is located, I certainly would like to get some clarification on this “Don’t Panic” thing.
Oh, sure, back in the archives is Plan B in case of a precipitous loss in oil. It probably includes mid-term development of alternate distribution for what remains of the economy, to wit, rail. But, you better believe that our Big Oil Buddies have made sure that those plans are located in the basement with no stairs containing the disused lavatory with the sign “Beware of the Leopard” and the locked filing cabinet.
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On a related note, Gov. Schwarzenegger says that California must build a High-speed Rail System, and the High-Speed Rail Authority, which is the commission in California in charge of developing a plan for high speed rail and a great name for a retro rock n roll band, estimates the cost of building the system to be more than $40 billion.
Dave P. Buemi of Prescient Marketing, writing for Renewable Energy Access, recently thought about the state of funding for the rail service while on board an Amtrak train returning from New York.
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