An electric dream for transport
Imagine an Australia with fast trains linking the major capital cities, diesel/electric trucks equipped with pantographs following overhead wires like trams in the inner city, electric vehicles dominating the passenger vehicle market, and 40 per cent of our electricity coming from renewable energy. Imagine, also, a smart phone-style “mobility manager” that allows you to make transport choices that can generate carbon credits, that can be accumulated and redeemed for restaurant vouchers, movie tickets and free travel. And all this by 2030.
This is the vision that European industrial giant Siemens is asking us to conjure up for our transport future. Well, not that far into the future, really. It seems clear to all the major industrial groups around the globe that the world’s energy and transport markets are about to undergo as profound a transformation as the communications industry has experienced over the last two decades, and they are gearing up and retooling their businesses to take advantage. Siemens’ "Picture the Future" series, and its latest focus on mobility, is its attempt to show not just what is possible, but also what might be necessary.
Australia has major issues in overland transportation. It got off to a bad start and never quite recovered. Manufacturers in Melbourne in the 1850s complained that it was cheaper to send goods overseas than to Sydney, and it’s still the case. The lack of investment in road infrastructure means that many of the cities are facing gridlock; emissions from transport are growing rapidly and are the highest per capita in the OECD; passenger vehicles will contribute half of those emissions by 2030 on a business-as-usual profile; and worse, on current projections Australia will have to import more than 90 per cent of its transport fuel needs by 2030, leaving it incredibly exposed to the same vagaries of supply security.
Given this, says Matt Rait, the head of the Picture the Future Mobility research at Siemens, Australia needs to begin a deliberate and widespread push into electrifying its transport network, which means a big push for electric vehicles, but also a much higher ambition for renewable energy deployment. Siemens, Europe’s biggest supplier of energy equipment, which recently dumped nuclear from its portfolio after Germany’s withdrawal, suggests 40 per cent of Australia’s power generation should come from renewables – particularly solar and wind – by 2030.
“We have to remove ourselves away from fossil energy,” Rait tells Climate Spectator in an interview ahead of the official release of the report today. He says EVs and renewable energy would each complement the weaknesses of the other. EVs needed renewables to validate their lower emission profile over internal combustion engines, and renewable energy needed EVs to act as mobile energy storage devices. That, says Rait, will avoid a lot of unnecessary generation investment – particularly in peaking plants. “It will change the whole mix,” he says.
Rait believes that EVs will be taken up, initially, as a second car for families. But within 10 years, a shift in battery technology to lithium-air from lithium-ion, will cure range anxiety by delivering distances of 600km before recharging. Bus systems, as shown in a recent trial in Brisbane, can also be electrified with 20 second fast charging stations.
But one of the really exciting innovations is the electric truck, the one vehicle that many said couldn’t be run on a battery. Siemens has just completed a successful trial in Berlin using trucks that use a hybrid electric diesel motor on longer distances, but have a tram-style system in the inner cities. Each truck would have a pantograph on the roof of the cabin that would draw electricity from overhead catenary wires, just like trams. Siemens also envisages centralised distribution centres, where long haul trucks – often half full – would deliver goods to an outer-city depot, where fully-laden electric trucks would take over on prescribed routes.
Rait says the savings could be immense – not just in fuel and emissions, but also in congestion and health. Along a 30km highway in Los Angeles, he says, where 35,000 truck trips are made each day, the rates of lung cancer are shocking. Australian data shows that the bill for transport emissions-related deaths is $3.3 billion, almost double the cost of road crash fatalities.
Siemens also pushes the argument for high-speed rail links between major cities. It points to the experience of Madrid and Barcelona, which it says used to be the busiest air link in the world. After the introduction of a high speed train, traffic is now split 50-50 between air and rail, and Rait believes a similar ratio could be possible between Melbourne and Sydney (now the world’s third busiest air link), with huge benefits for congestion as the trains pick up passengers from satellite cities that would normally use road transport.
Rait says Australians will continue to value mobility, so policy makers cannot simply hope that people will get off the road, they just need to provide a smarter solution. Research is showing that telecommuting is not delivering savings in transport, because people working at home spend more time in the car instead ferrying kids to and from school, going shopping and other activities.
So Siemens envisages a “mobility management system” that offers – via devices such as a smart phone – a connection between a multitude of transport systems, and offers the cheapest, quickest and cleanest route to your destination. It could even generate individual carbon credits depending on your choice of transport. (Commuters remembering the problems the NSW government has had developing a ticket that can be used in both the train and the bus system can be excused for being just a little bit sceptical). Rait, however, insists it is not that far away, and would be little more than an extension of the latest smart phones. “It’s just a matter of bringing that information together and running through the algorithms. The technology is there, it just needs a meeting of the willing.”
And can that be done? Rait suggests, firstly, looking at the cost of inaction: $11 billion from congestion, $27 billion from road trauma, and $58 billion from other health-related costs. If Australia aims to reduce that by 20 per cent a year, that frees up a notional $20 billion for investment straight away. The other issue is one of global competitiveness. The country’s inefficient supply chain is one of its biggest barriers to competition for local industry, and being reliant almost entirely on imported transport fuel would place Australia in a vulnerable position – both in commerce and in security – in the event of some sort of fuel shock.
Then there is the opportunity. Australia, he says, could play a major roll in the development of “electric mobility," as it is likely that many of the emerging middle class in developing economies will leapfrog the internal combustion engine and move straight into electric vehicle networks. “We need to start acting now, and by 2030 we need to be a long way down the road.” Rait likes to compare the Australian transport system to an orchestra with various sections working off different song sheets, making their own noise. All it needs is a strong central conductor, and universal regulation and governance. Does that sound too hard? What? Oh.
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Comments on this article
Until the electric dream is
Until the electric dream is here we still have so much to wait. I don't see me or any people I know at the moment willing an ready to buy an electric car. Things change but not that fast. My car needed new airtex fuel pumps so I though about more options: getting a new car or installing the new parts on my car. Until the end I decided for the new parts, I'll just keep using my car for a while.
"Deliberate and widspread push"
Hats off to Matt Rait for stating the bleeding obvious that "Australia needs to begin a deliberate and widespread push into electrifying its transport network" if not for the potential environmental and health benefits but for the energy security it offers the nation. I've also read a lot of these reports that are produced by "Europe’s biggest supplier of energy equipment" or similar who stand to make massive profits (on top of the billions they already make each year) if the general population adopt this technology. Now call me a sceptic but as an EV owner (before you ask, it's powered by the energy produced by my solar array) I wouldn't mind betting that I could visit every Siemens site/office in Australia, count up all te EV's they own and I would be in front by 1. In short, companies like Siemens need to read their own reports and invest (as opposed to spend) a very small percentage of their billions in this technology before telling the population at large what they could/would/should do. I really do believe electrification represents the future of transport but we we need corporations like Siemens to do more 'walking' than 'talking' if it's to become widely accepted in the near future.
Matt, if you're reading this and I'm wrong please let us know about the electric vehicles you already have in your Australian fleet (I'm not holding my breath).
Electric transport dream
There must be a safe way to run rubber tyres on electrically-powered vehicles Geoff Collet - trolley buses do this everyday all over Europe. Millions of passengers daily.
Trolley Buses
Geoff,
Brisbane had trolley buses as well as trams into the 1960s. The two wire power supply and return system had sufficient flexibility for the buses to pull into curbs, go around obstacles, etc. I have thought for a while that trolley buses could be the lowest cost way to electrify public transport where there are no existing tram or train lines as they use the existing roads and existing diesel buses could be converted to electric. The main cost, of course, would be to run the overhead wires and set up the power supply infrastructure. I don't see why trolley buses should not have a bright future.
Electric road vehicles connected to electric grid.
Electric road tramsport? 1940s and 50s saw electric passenger bus routes in Sydney and Hobart. Long gone, history. They had twin overhead wires and connecting poles which often had to be re connected to wires. Pantograph and earth return OK on steel wheels and rails. I would be very wary of touching a rubber tyred vehicle with a 600 V, DC earth return. Very savage bite if any fault in return path.
Resource constraints faced by electric vehicles
On Seeking Alpha, James Petersen's articles highlight the lack of resource analysis in looking at the potential for electric as opposed to hybrid vehicles both in quantites of scarce materials needed and maximising savings of petroleum per unit of scarce mineral/metal resource.
http://seekingalpha.com/author/john-petersen/articles
Perhaps Hybrids and Stop Start technologies will be far more efficent.
Some form of differential pricing of petroleum or registration for primarily passenger gas guzzlers might also swing markets to smaller cars.
The Elephant in the room
From the article "the cost of inaction: $11 billion from congestion, $27 billion from road trauma, and $58 billion from other health-related costs."
What is this almost $100 billion being spent on now ?
In a capitalist democracy these dollars are not treated simply as costs. Most of this money supports an immense number of workers, from the bureaucracy, through the oil industry, automotive manufacture, maintenance and repair, the transport industry and even the health professions. What will you do with these people's jobs ?
If we try to introduce useful changes the first thing vested interests will do is run a lobby campaign on job losses, the politicians will take fright, the policy will get voted down, and things will go on as usual.
We need some more depth in our forward planning before we will get real change.
an electric dream for transport
How stupid! Most commuters travelling between home and work travel distances longer than could be managed by walking or bicyle. Some checking of commuter travel statistics in the greater Sydney and Melbourne metropolitan regions would confirm this. Some attention to the facts would be much more useful than loose assertions about 'most people' living 'here'.
here
It doesn't matter WHERE "here" is, the vast majority of travelling is NOT between capital cities, it's within walking/cycling distance.
Those distances are the REAL challenges of the future. If I want to see friends in Sydney or NZ I use Skype......
NOBODY needs to travel 1000km at a whim.......
What we need is a vision and a strategy
Well done to Siemens for providing both. If our government can look out beyond the electoral cycle and prepare a vision and strategy, there are plenty of companies like Siemens (and Schneider, ABB, GE, Samsung, First Solar, Vestas and Johnson Controls to name a few) are already investing heavily to make this happen. The technology is there, we as a country just need a 20 year roadmap and a government committed to removing regulatory impediments put in to protect incumbent self-serving special interest groups (like the fossil fuel industry). Lets use PM Julia Gillard's new price on carbon pollution and mining tax to help fund the transition to the future for all Australians. A cleaner, healthier and more sustainable economy.
Does that sound too hard? What? Oh.
Judging by many of these comments, the final 'oh' signifies the human factor.
I am not sure where Dan is going to find cheap or expensive fossil fuels when the resources are thoroughly depleted.
Clearly Mike Stasse lives in a bubble. He calls it 'here'. Where is 'here'?
We must address, as the article says, the amount of money wasted on congestion.But when you live 10ks from 'here', why not walk.
Very fast trains have been operating in Western Europe and Japan and are being built in South Korea. China emabrrassed itself by taking Japanese technology that could sustain high speeds, then copyrighted a Chinese version that operated at greater and unsustainable speeds.
Regional, slower, trains work well for cheaper, people-moving transport. Leave Sydney, travel to Singapore to try one example of an effective rapid transit system.
Not everyione lives 10 ks from a city centre and not everyone is young enough to walk.
Fast Trains
What we need first is to relay the existing line between Sydney and Melbourne.
When the line was built the earth moving machinery was a scoop and horses. So many hills were routed around instead of cutting through. The resulting speed restrictions are a major cause of the time taken for the trip.
What we need is a fast enough service and straightening the track will make a major difference. It will enable the existing trains to average around 120 km or better.
It will also have a major advantage for freight, especially when the line is electrified.
The cost of the TGV type of high speed train is now beyond our ability to fund. In a time of zero growth and credit failure we have reached a time when we must aim for more modest acheivements.
Integrate the present to arrive at a big picture
Its truly odd that at the same time as rolling out the NBN you are discussing additional infrastructure to move people about. One of NBN's big selling points is that you can be anywhere, with out moving at all. With reduced personal travel is there adequate scale for this sort of pipe dream? As far as moving goods about, at the rate things are going now, the only transport we need is from docks to online buyer and from mine to docks.
I would also anticipate the screams as additional street scapes are endowed with a latice of wires. Given the failure of present wire systems in place, we can look forward to grid lock as they get in a tangle.
Yep I am more likely to get better at riding my bike, tele commute and save for the over seas trip.
Integrate the present to arrive at a big picture
Its truly odd that at the same time as rolling out the NBN you are discussing additional infrastructure to move people about. One of NBN's big selling points is that you can be anywhere, with out moving at all. With reduced personal travel is there adequate scale for this sort of pipe dream? As far as moving goods about, at the rate things are going now, the only transport we need is from docks to online buyer and from mine to docks.
I would also anticipate the screams as additional street scapes are endowed with a latice of wires. Given the failure of present wire systems in place, we can look forward to grid lock as they get in a tangle.
Yep I am more likely to get better at riding my bike, tele commute and save for the over seas trip.
Electric transport dreams
Dream on!
While renew-able power is the only solution to both near term problems of Global Warming and fossil fuel resource depletion, (See: http//:camwest.pps.au/renewable-energy) it will always be more expensive than fossil fuels because we rely on the fossil fuels to manufacture the materials needed to build the renew-able infrastructure. While electric motors are more efficient than internal combustion motors the generation and distribution of the electricity together is far less efficient. Batteries have limited life and a very much higher energy input to manufacture than IC motors. Closer to reality is to dream of motorways and roads full of cyclists, the most energy efficient personal transportation yet developed by man.
Dan
some vision
The very start of this article, "Imagine an Australia with fast trains linking the major capital cities" immediately rankled with me..... because what we REALLY need is slow trains linking local communities everywhere.
In an energy constrained future, travelling interstate at high speed will be unimaginable.... most of the people I know live within ten km of here. They are the ones who will matter after the shit hits the fan. Which, from reading the news, could now occur any day!
Smartphone Ride Sharing - coseats.com
Ride sharing could be one factor in making transport smarter and more environmentally friendly. One look at the congested motorways during peak hour traffic tells the story. Most of the vehicles are single occupant vehicles, which means there is lots of unused capacity.
Smartphone enabled ride sharing (e.g. coseats.com) makes it easy for people to share their rides regularly or spontaneously.