March 2021 HOUSE OF LORDS SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY COMMITTEE INQUIRY ROLE OF BATTERIES AND FUEL CELLS IN ACHIEVING NET ZERO RESPONSE FROM THE RAILWAY INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION (RIA)
1. INTRODUCTION This submission constitutes the response from the Railway Industry Association (RIA) to the House of Lords Science & Technology Committee into the role of batteries and fuel cells. 2.
BACKGROUND TO RIA 2.1 RIA is the trade association for UK-based suppliers to the UK and world-wide railways. It has some 300 companies in membership covering all aspects of rolling stock and infrastructure supply and a diverse range of products and services. As well as most of the larger, multi-national companies, 60% of RIA's membership base is comprised of SMEs. 2.2 The Oxford Economics 2018 report shows that the UK rail sector contributes annually over £36bn Gross Value Added (GVA) to the UK economy, employs some 600,000 people and generates £11bn in tax revenues. For every £1 spent on rail, £2.20 of income is generated in the wider economy, meaning rail is not just an important sector in its own right, but it is also crucial for UK plc, its economy and connectivity. 2.3 Rail has been a growing industry with the number of rail journeys expected to double in the next 25 years, along with significant growth in rail freight traffic, regardless of shocks such as the present Coronavirus crisis. The full Oxford Economics report can be accessed here. 2.4 The Oxford Economics report also highlights the fact that the UK rail industry is a significant exporter, selling £800 million in goods and services abroad each year, whilst the European rail trade body UNIFE’s recently-released World Rail Market Study report predicts annual rail market growth of between 1 and 2.3% until 2025, when an annual volume of approximately €240bn per annum could be expected. 2.5 RIA provides its members with extensive services, including: • Representation of the supply industry's interests to Government, Network Rail (NR), TfL, HS2, ORR and other key stakeholders; • Opportunities for dialogue and networking between members, including several Special and Technical Interest Groups; • Supply chain improvement initiatives; • Provision of technical, commercial and political information every week; • Export promotional activity, through briefings, overseas rail trade missions, hosting of inwards visits; and • Organising UK presence at rail exhibitions overseas on GREAT branded UK Pavilions. 2.6 RIA recognises that equality, diversity, and inclusion drive innovation, financial performance and success. Together with Women in Rail, RIA is promoting an Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Charter for Rail, which has the potential to support social mobility, grow UK STEM skills, create local opportunities, and increase the talent pool from which the future leadership of the rail sector will be drawn. 1/6
3.
BACKGROUND
3.1 Rail is a low carbon mode of transport, contributing just 1.4% of transport emissions despite carrying 10% of all journeys. Rail accounts for only 0.5% of all UK emissions. Following the Coronavirus pandemic, getting passengers and freight back onto the rail network will ensure our railways continue to support low carbon travel, whilst also creating jobs, investment, and economic growth. However, to achieve the UK Government's legal commitment to Net Zero by 2050 and its aim to take all dieselonly trains off the rail network by 2040 in England and Wales (and 2035 in Scotland), further action will be needed. 3.2 Hydrogen and battery technology has a role to play, alongside electrification, in decarbonising the rail network. As set out in the Rail Industry Decarbonisation Report of 20191, decarbonisation of the railways should consider the network in three categories: • Category 1 - The core electrified network, where traffic is most intense and thus a business case to electrify, delivered via a rolling electrification programme. • Category 2 - The parts of the network which are less-intensively-used, where there is unlikely to be a business case for continuous electrification. This creates an opportunity to introduce new zero-carbon technology in volume within five years, as existing fleets come due for replacement. This is where existing trains converted to hydrogen or new hydrogen trains could have a role. • Category 3 - The parts of the network between so-called Category 1 and 2, which can be served, in the medium term, by bi-mode trains which draw power from the Overhead line Equipment (OLE) in electrified areas, but are self-powered ‘off the wires’ currently by diesel, although increasingly for lighter duty cycles by other zero carbon technologies. 3.3 For heavy rail, electrification is the most efficient power source in a technological sense, as trains powered by an external power source do not need to carry their own fuel or energy storage. Electrification also allows trains to directly use renewable energy via the national grid or potentially, in future, through direct feed-in from local renewable supplies. 3.4 Electrification also allows regenerative braking technologies to be employed without energy storage upon the train. Energy storage is a key constraint for other technologies and the limited storage space and associated weight means that, even with expected technical improvements in battery and fuel cell technologies, they are not able to store enough energy to operate a freight train or higher speed (above c100 mph) passenger train over a normal operational range. 3.5 Electrified railways are the gold-standard of zero-carbon transport solutions. In this context, batteries, hydrogen fuel cells, and other local energy storage and generation technologies should be seen as supplementary solutions; either as a stop-gap until a line is able to be electrified, or for the long-term where it remains uneconomical to fully electrify. 3.6 Rail decarbonisation presents an opportunity to create green economic growth, whilst developing a new UK industry, building new skilled job opportunities and investment, as well as creating a competitive industry from which the UK could export its products and expertise abroad. Therefore RIA is calling for a rolling programme of electrification and fleet orders of low carbon, self-powered rolling stock, such as hydrogen and battery technology. As, Parliament’s Transport Committee recently highlighted,2 this work needs to begin soon given the Government’s Net Zero legal commitment and the need to maintain continuity of skills and capabilities in the industry.
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See Rail Industry Decarbonisation report - https://www.rssb.co.uk/en/Research-andTechnology/Sustainability/Decarbonisation/Decarbonisation-our-final-report-to-the-Rail-Minister 2 https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/153/transport-committee/news/152995/transport-committee-tohit-its-own-decarbonisation-deadline-government-must-set-out-clear-strategy-for-rail-network/
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4.
ROLE OF BATTERIES IN THE RAIL INDUSTRY
4.1 Batteries have a significant role in decarbonising the UK rail network. According to Network Rail’s Traction Decarbonisation Network Strategy, around 400km of railway lines will require battery trains by 2050 in order to achieve Net Zero on the rail network. 4.2 RIA believe there is a larger role for battery trains in the transition to net-zero carbon in 2050. Although electrification will be the primary method of decarbonisation it will take a long time to implement. There is therefore a major opportunity to deploy battery and fuel cell passenger trains in the interim before wiring as is being proposed in Scotland between Aberdeen and Inverness. 4.3 Trains featuring some form of battery energy storage can support the electrification of the network, by bridging gaps in electrified areas of track. This is known as discontinuous electrification, and has a number of applications, including cost-savings when electrifying costly parts of the network, such as under bridges or through tunnels, or by ensuring routes are able to decarbonise whilst electrification work takes place. This approach is in the process of being implemented on the Cardiff Valley’s electrification project. However careful trade off’s need to be considered because discontinuous electrification may not be suitable for all trains, such as freight and therefore discontinuous electrification requires careful consideration of how a line will be used. Recent innovations have also meant engineers no longer have to undertake major engineering works to structures such as bridges, but can add measures so the electrification can continue without the cost and disruption of major infrastructure work.3 This would allow freight trains to run on these lines. 4.4 Batteries can also be retrofitted on some existing diesel trains, with a hybrid powertrain reducing overall fuel consumption and emissions. Given the average age of these trains is 20 – 30 years, this can provide the benefit of ensuring that we do not require new trains to be built to replace those currently on the network, given the embedded carbon implications of replacing rolling stock before it has become life-expired. This is illustrated by the Hitachi case study below. 4.1 There is also an opportunity for the use of batteries in Light and Very Light Rail.4 Very Light Rail is a new battery-powered transport mode based on creating lightweight, energy efficient rail vehicles that offer low manufacturing, infrastructure and operational costs. Very Light Rail offers the opportunity for new, cost effective transport solutions to be installed across the UK. The benefit of using battery technology with Very Light Rail schemes include: • Zero tailpipe emissions, reducing carbon and air pollution • Very light track, saving cost and time to deploy • Fully autonomous charging on route, saving traditional plug-in recharge time • No overhead lines, saving capital cost • Self-contained charge stations, quick to install and relocate 4.2 Very Light Rail uses ‘Opportunity Charging’, which involves the use of autonomous, wireless, highpowered charging infrastructure at strategic locations along a route. Charging stations rapidly charge vehicles at scheduled stops, avoiding long periods of recharging time with the vehicle out of service. This means that services do not need to be restricted, or the vehicle fleet expanded, to accommodate recharging. Opportunity Charging allows for smaller batteries, meaning more seats for passengers. It also provides for online monitoring, enabling operators to make the most effective use of vehicles and manage energy supply effectively. There is also the potential to use Opportunity Charging for
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See example here: https://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/news/cardiff-bridge-avoids-gbp-40m-demolitionthanks-to-electric-resistant-paint 4 This is not considered by Network Rail’s Interim Traction Decarbonisation Network Strategy which covers the traditional ‘heavy rail’ network.
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Category 2 heavy rail, for example, smaller branch line services, with stations providing charge to batteries at terminal stations.5 5. ROLE OF HYDROGEN FUEL CELLS IN THE RAIL INDUSTRY 5.1 Hydrogen trains are a viable option for the UK rail network with two examples of RIA members involved in hydrogen train development. At present, up to 100mph speed and a range of 600 to 800 miles is feasible. Such a train would be a plausible direct replacement for existing Diesel Multiple Units (DMUs) although, in comparison, a hydrogen train would need to be refuelled more frequently. While a hydrogen train would not need electrification infrastructure, it will need new refuelling infrastructure and a hydrogen supply chain. 5.2 Thus a hydrogen self-powered passenger train is a viable solution on longer and less intensively used regional routes, with speeds of 100mph or less, where there is no economic case for electrification. Stored at 350bar pressure, hydrogen requires approximately nine times the storage volume of diesel for the same range and performance, and so, without further technical development in storage solutions, it is unlikely to be able to offer a solution for higher speed or main line freight trains, both of which require much higher installed power and hence stored energy to achieve longer ranges. For these duties, other than diesel, electric traction remains the only plausible option. Hydrogen therefore has a role on less intensively used lines, but should not be seen as an alternative to a rolling programme of electrification, which is needed to decarbonise the rail network by 2040. 5.3 The source of hydrogen is a significant factor in the carbon reduction compared to diesel. While hydrogen created using renewable electricity could be zero carbon, using today’s grid mix, hydrogen from electrolysis is only slightly lower (4%) than diesel carbon, and hydrogen from reformation of natural gas is 24% lower. It is for this reason that proposed schemes for hydrogen train deployment all plan to use green hydrogen which would make a hydrogen train lower emission than a train running under wires powered by the electricity grid. The creation of green hydrogen remains expensive at present but the cost is anticipated to drop with increased levels of use for rail and other applications. There is also an opportunity to develop a rail line in an area where hydrogen is produced as a byproduct, such as in the chemical industry. Fully homologated Hydrogen trains have been operated in daily passenger service for two years in Germany, for several months in Austria and in trials in the Netherlands, with the Alstom Cordia iLint, and with the HydroFLEX demonstrator undertaking UK mainline testing. Alstom has taken orders for three designs of hydrogen trains for use in Germany, Italy and France. 5.4 The Rail Industry Decarbonisation Taskforce estimate that there are, or shortly will be, about 3,0003,300 diesel passenger vehicles that will need to be replaced, re-engined or converted in order to decarbonise the network. Of these, 2,400 trains could be converted with alternative low-carbon traction options such as hydrogen or battery. This is an opportunity to utilise both the large number of trains going off-lease in the coming years, due to a significant number of new trains coming on line and to develop new trains for the UK market. 6. CASE STUDIES 6.1 Please find below a number of case studies that RIA has collated on behalf of its membership. A) BATTERY CASE STUDIES •
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Hitachi Rail: Hitachi Rail has been developing alternative fuelled trains since 2003, including a pilot hydrogen fuel cell train in 2006 and one of the world’s first passenger service battery trains in Japan in 2016 (Dual Energy Charge Train, or DENCHA). In 2007, Hitachi Rail fitted a hybrid test train – known as This paper gives example of Ipswich to Felixstowe: https://opbrid.info/rail-charging
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a Class 43 HST – with batteries, which ran over 100,000 km. The ‘Haybusa’ train produced no emissions out of stations and provided a 15% fuel saving. Hitachi has recently announced a partnership to work towards a UK trial on one of its intercity fleets, operated by GWR, which runs between London and Penzance. In this instance, the batteries will supplement the existing engines and allow the train to run in and out of stations under battery power alone. In the first phase, our modelling suggests we can save more than 20% of fuel and carbon emissions, with an ambition for further savings. Proposals have also been developed to include batteries on their regional trains – like the Class 385 trains that run across Scotland’s Central Belt – to give them in an additional range of up to 100km on battery power alone. Hitachi Rail have also signed a contract involving battery with Hyperdrive, to manufacture batteries at Hyperdrive’s HYVE facility in Sunderland, and then installing them at Hitachi Rail’s factory in Newton Aycliffe. •
Siemens Mobility: Siemens has selected LTO (Lithium Titanate Oxide) battery cells as standard technology for all its propulsion requirements. This offers significant benefits over the alternative NMC (Nickel Manganese Cobalt) cells. Specifically, LTO cells have a significantly longer lifetime than NMC (potentially 15 years versus six years for NMC), they do not exhibit the charging, resilience issues or operational limitations of NMC, have 20-30% more usable energy as the result of far superior Depth of Discharge, and are much safer to operate. Siemens has committed supply agreements with two of the world’s leading LTO Suppliers. Following a 3-Year programme, a Battery/EMU “eco” Bi-Mode 3-Car train has been delivered and has operated very successfully in passenger service on Austrian State Railways (OBB) since August 2019. This train is a modified version of a current order (still under construction) for 200 “City Jet” EMU trains for OBB and Siemens, with a follow on order under discussion. Siemens continues to work on battery technology but highlights the limitation of the range of any battery operation between charges which it sees as more than 80km.
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Alstom: Alstom has selected fast charging, high-performance ‘MITRAC Pulse’ lithium-ion. batteries. This technology has been operating successfully for five years on a catenary-free light rail system in Nanjing, China. To demonstrate this technology for mainline heavy rail applications, Alstom has created a demonstrator onboard its existing TALENT 3 EMU in Germany. The train’s batteries are charged while driving, or at stations under the overhead line, or with the aid of recovered braking energy. As soon as the train travels on non-electrified lines, the roof-mounted batteries supply the required electricity in an efficient, zero-emissions way. Both case studies use Alstom’s Generation 1.0 ‘MITRAC Pulse’ traction battery subsystem but Generation 1.1 technology with 30% increased energy density is now available, and the company expects soon to offer Generation 1.2, yielding another 20% improvement in energy density. The base technology can also be applied to Alstom’s UK products (AVENTRA, ELECTROSTAR and CORADIA) in addition to rolling stock manufactured by other manufacturers.
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Furrer+Frey: Furrer+Frey is developing charging infrastructure for the world’s first Very Light Rail (VLR) system being trialled in Dudley at the VLR National Innovation Centre. The Very Light Rail proofof-concept project is being overseen by the Black Country Innovative Manufacturing Organisation (BCIMO). The charging system uses Opportunity Charging technology already deployed for bus fleets in Europe and could be interoperable with electric buses.
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B) HYDROGEN CASE STUDIES •
The Alstom Breeze: The Breeze has been developed by Alstom and Eversholt Rail on the basis of the proven technology embodied in Alstom’s Coradia iLint. Two trains have operated over 180,000km in passenger service near Hamburg, demonstrating reliable and safe operation in normal revenue operation for nearly two years. Breeze is based on the successful Class 321 electric multiple units owned by Eversholt Rail. These units operate widely in the UK but are approaching the end of their current leases and so can be made available for conversion. The Breeze can be configured for speeds of up to 100mph but initial variants have been proposed to operate at 90mph, with a range of in excess of 600 miles at maximum load, based on modelled data derived from the extensive operation of the Coradia iLint. Breeze has been offered to a number of operators considering introduction of hydrogen trains. The full build project could have a first fleet in service within three years of being ordered.
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Porterbrook & Birmingham Centre for Rail Research and Education (BCRRE): BCRRE and Porterbrook developed the UK’s first hydrogen powered train in just nine months. From concept to launch at RailLive in June 2019, the team designed, developed, built, commissioned and carried out a low speed test operation of a fully working hydrogen fuel cell train. Based on a Class 319 electric unit, the train is now fitted with hydrogen fuel tanks, a fuel cell and battery pack to provide independent traction power capable of operation with zero carbon emissions. In September 2020, HydroFLEX started mainline testing and the production version is being configured for operation using both overheadelectric-wires and hydrogen for non-electrified routes
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Siemens Mobility: In 2017, Siemens and Ballard, the world’s leading Fuel Cell supplier signed an agreement to develop a new generation of Fuel Cells, fully tractionised - specifically for Rail Vehicle use. It offers 3 times the life of other Fuel Cells, is more compact and significantly more efficient, together with having much improved cold weather operation capability. The first pre-production unit has now completed extensive type testing at the Siemens facility at the University of Aachen and in November 2020, Deutsche Bahn and Siemens Mobility announced a programme to jointly evaluate the introduction and operation of Hydrogen Fuel Cell Powered Trains onto the German Federal Network. The programme will include the development of a completely new fuelling system capable of refuelling the train in the same time (15 minutes) as a diesel train. The hydrogen itself will be produced on site at the maintenance facility using traction electricity generated from renewable sources by Siemens electrolyser equipment. During its planned trial operation between Tübingen and Pforzheim in 2024, the new hydrogen drive fitted to this single train will save around 330 tons of CO2 each year. Ranges of up to 600miles are achievable. The Desiro Verve Platform is currently under development for the UK. The Verve will be available as an EMU, together with “Plus B” (Battery Capability) and “Plus H” (Hydrogen Fuel Cell capability) EMU Bi-Modes and also as a “Plus H” Independently Hydrogen powered train. General Parameters are a top Speed of 125 mph (under OLE) – later variants with 140mph capability and a top Speed of 100 mph (under independent Power). Flexible Train formation from 3 - 10-Car Units (Bi-Modes from 4-10-Car Units). Siemens will offer Desiro Verve to potential customers from late Q3 2021.
If you would like further information, please contact Public Affairs & PR Director Max Sugarman at max.sugarman@riagb.org.uk and 07399 042 383.
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