Analysis
Getting to the heart of the matter
PHILIP HAIGH attends an Institution of Mechanical Engineers seminar, where he hears about cost-cutting measures to fitting overhead line equipment and the development of fast-charge battery technology
WIDESPREAD electrification is unlikely to be affordable or deliverable.
That’s the view of the Great British Railways Transition Team, as expressed by Head of Strategic Planning Rich Fisher to a seminar held by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers on March 19.
However, Fisher added that there was a case for targeted electrification to follow current plans to wire the Midland Main Line and the trans-Pennine route via Huddersfield.
These targeted schemes fill lengthy gaps, but also wire end-to-end routes. The gaps include Cardiff-Swansea, Wootton Basset Junction-Bath-Bristol Temple Meads-Bristol Parkway, Newbury-Castle Cary, Reading-Basingstoke, and Hurst Green-Uckfield.
Fisher’s targeted longer routes include Felixstowe to Peterborough and then to Doncaster via Lincoln (the Great Northern/Great Eastern ‘joint’ line), Didcot to Birmingham via Leamington, Coventry, Nuneaton and Water Orton, and Didcot to Birmingham via Leamington and Dorridge.
Around Doncaster, further work would wire to Hull, from Sheffield to Church Fenton, and from Ravensthorpe through Wakefield Kirkgate to Milford.
He explained that for these routes, electrification was the clear answer, but that decisions would need more work around affordability and technology development.
Some of these technology developments come around the way in which electricity reaches wired routes. Other savings come in the way engineers apply technology, and further savings come from the way the railway applies standards.
As an example of applying standards, Network Rail electrification expert Richard Stainton told the seminar that NR would no longer be applying ice loading to overhead line equipment (OLE).
Traditionally, railway engineers have assumed that ice would build up on wires to a radius of 9.5mm.
This increases the overall weight which OLE structures and fittings must carry.
However, Stainton said this figure had been traced back to 1886, when the River Thames last froze over, and that NR no longer considered it necessary.
Lightening the weight carried by OLE could allow longer span lengths between masts, with Stainton talking about spans of up to 95 metres. This means fewer masts, fewer foundations, and more flexibility for a designer in deciding where to place masts.
NR is also reconsidering how it makes bridge parapets higher to protect people from OLE passing underneath.
In making them higher, NR often has to make them wider too, which constricts the carriageway and can cause costs to balloon, according to Stainton.
So, NR pl
