Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 134 posts

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#61

Post by guard-of-terra »

claudius wrote: post #37
jdietrich wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to figures in an OECD report, rail freight has significantly higher CO2 emissions per tonne-km - 41-102g vs 30-40g. http://www.oecd.org/trade/envtrade/2386636.pdf (p. 29)

Note that this is for diesel trains. While likely most of the length of the track won’t be electrified soon, essentially all tracks in western Europe (France, Germany, possibly Poland) are already electrified. This means that using nuclear or renewable energy generation, the trains can run emission-free there, in particular avoiding the strongly localised particle emissions by ships in and around harbours.

Most of the length is electrified already. Yekaterinburg-Madrid definitely, Kazakhstan-Yekaterinburg likely, China-Kazakhstan connection and Chinese side probably remains an issue.

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#62

Post by arctangent »

bkor wrote: post #42
samhamilton wrote: post #7

I would guess that this is rolling out just for the PR, the sheer number of trains needed to replace one decent sized container ship just makes this all prohibitive to ever replace much sea freight plus launching when there is a glut of container ships floating around as well, which is keeping the price lower than most ship owners can breakeven. Ok so it's quicker, but it's not that quick. The only winners would be t…

Everyone is forgetting another option. Say your factory is relying on parts delivered to you by containers. One week there's heavy storms somewhere in Asia and your containers from China aren't loaded. Currently the only option is to either always keep a buffer of parts or to gamble and use airfreight in case needed. With such a rail option you'll have an alternative: by default use container vessel then in case of a…

It's a hedge bet.

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#63

Post by crdoconnor »

bkor wrote: post #42
samhamilton wrote: post #7

I would guess that this is rolling out just for the PR, the sheer number of trains needed to replace one decent sized container ship just makes this all prohibitive to ever replace much sea freight plus launching when there is a glut of container ships floating around as well, which is keeping the price lower than most ship owners can breakeven. Ok so it's quicker, but it's not that quick. The only winners would be t…

Everyone is forgetting another option. Say your factory is relying on parts delivered to you by containers. One week there's heavy storms somewhere in Asia and your containers from China aren't loaded. Currently the only option is to either always keep a buffer of parts or to gamble and use airfreight in case needed. With such a rail option you'll have an alternative: by default use container vessel then in case of a…

Also blockades. This lets China continue trading with Europe if access to the straits of Malacca or Suez canal are cut off.

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#64

Post by loxs »

samhamilton wrote: post #7

I would guess that this is rolling out just for the PR, the sheer number of trains needed to replace one decent sized container ship just makes this all prohibitive to ever replace much sea freight plus launching when there is a glut of container ships floating around as well, which is keeping the price lower than most ship owners can breakeven. Ok so it's quicker, but it's not that quick. The only winners would be t…

What you say is true, if we only take into consideration shipping from coastal China.

But I would presume there is geo-strategic interest for China to try and improve its internal and western regions. If we take this into consideration, it may be very efficient to directly ship via train to Europe, instead of first going several thousand km to the east, to reach China's coast.

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#65

Post by jdietrich »

claudius wrote: post #37
jdietrich wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to figures in an OECD report, rail freight has significantly higher CO2 emissions per tonne-km - 41-102g vs 30-40g. http://www.oecd.org/trade/envtrade/2386636.pdf (p. 29)

Note that this is for diesel trains. While likely most of the length of the track won’t be electrified soon, essentially all tracks in western Europe (France, Germany, possibly Poland) are already electrified. This means that using nuclear or renewable energy generation, the trains can run emission-free there, in particular avoiding the strongly localised particle emissions by ships in and around harbours.

German electricity is fairly dirty and Polish electricity is absolutely filthy - they're both heavily reliant on coal. Germany is committed to phasing out all of their existing nuclear plants by 2022; Poland has no nuclear capacity and is unlikely to have any before 2030.

Renewables are clearly going to be a growing part of the energy mix, but the issue of base load is still an unanswered question.

https://electricitymap.tmrow.co/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Germany#Closu... http://www.platts.com/latest-news/electric-power/warsaw/poli...

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#66

Post by bkor »

simonh wrote: post #52
bkor wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone is forgetting another option. Say your factory is relying on parts delivered to you by containers. One week there's heavy storms somewhere in Asia and your containers from China aren't loaded. Currently the only option is to either always keep a buffer of parts or to gamble and use airfreight in case needed. With such a rail option you'll have an alternative: by default use container vessel then in case of a…

>With such a rail option you'll have an alternative: by default use container vessel then in case of a problem switch to the rail. That wouldn't make the rail system a sustainable business because it would only make money when there are problems with sea freight. To be sustainable it needs regular bookings. That's likely to be high value goods where timely and reliable delivery are important. Also bear in mind these…

There's a crazy amount of containers going from China to Europe. IMO just 200 containers on one train far from not enough. Shipping by sea is NOT reliable and there are an insane amount of containers being delivered every week.

I don't get your point about goods are shipped directly to cities? The train goes to Rotterdam and various other locations. Rotterdam has a huge infrastructure (train/truck/barge) already for delivering containers to the final destination. That would just be reused.

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#67

Post by jdietrich »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #61
claudius wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note that this is for diesel trains. While likely most of the length of the track won’t be electrified soon, essentially all tracks in western Europe (France, Germany, possibly Poland) are already electrified. This means that using nuclear or renewable energy generation, the trains can run emission-free there, in particular avoiding the strongly localised particle emissions by ships in and around harbours.

Most of the length is electrified already. Yekaterinburg-Madrid definitely, Kazakhstan-Yekaterinburg likely, China-Kazakhstan connection and Chinese side probably remains an issue.

I would wager that Chinese and Russian electricity is no cleaner than diesel. They have an awful lot of old coal power stations burning lignite and sub-bituminous coal.

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#68

Post by corobo »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #3
MengerSponge wrote: post #2

Does anyone know how the train compares to ships wrt CO2/kg shipped? I'm sure the train comes out on top, but by how much? Also, how frequently could one of those trains run?

Not sure about CO2 impact, but one problem is that these trains are running pretty empty back to china (china doesn't want to import so much from Europe by rail). I think they are running 50 trains a year, with a heavy subsidy to make it affordable (half the cost).

Do the freight ships do the same? What do they bring back with them?

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#69

Post by bkor »

pcurve wrote: post #6
ec109685 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Price would also be good to know. If it is 1/100 of the price, then 100 trains could be run for every boat.

Looks like its cheaper than boat... http://richardtorian.blogspot.com/2012/01/cost-per-ton-mile-...

That data is highly questionable. Suggest trying to get some quotes for the different modalities. Via ocean is cheapest by far. To deliver to the final destination the price increases in order of barge/rail/truck.

I work for a shipping company btw. Don't have experience about the prices globally, but that source divides data from two completely different sources. That often doesn't end well.

There are companies tracking the average price of shipping a container across various trades.

Re: First China-U.K. Freight Train Departs as Xi Seeks to Lift Trade

#70

Post by guard-of-terra »

jdietrich wrote: post #67
guard-of-terra wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the length is electrified already. Yekaterinburg-Madrid definitely, Kazakhstan-Yekaterinburg likely, China-Kazakhstan connection and Chinese side probably remains an issue.

I would wager that Chinese and Russian electricity is no cleaner than diesel. They have an awful lot of old coal power stations burning lignite and sub-bituminous coal.

Most of Russian generation is natural gas, with notable hydro and nuclear.

Anyway, this is fixable. Planes and ships are not.

Post reply on HN