The report’s key findings (see Further Reading 5) were:
■ The UK should legislate as soon as possible to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
■ Wales should set a target for a 95% reduction in emissions by 2050 relative to 1990 levels of GHG emissions.
■ Scotland has proportionately greater potential for emissions removal than the UK overall, and can credibly adopt a more ambitious target. It should aim for net-zero GHGs by 2045.
A net-zero GHG target by 2050 (i.e. a 100% reduction from baseline 1990 levels) corresponds with the latest climate science and would deliver on the commitment that the UK made by signing the Paris Agreement.
It is achievable with known technologies, alongside improvements in people’s lives, and within the expected economic cost that Parliament accepted when it legislated the existing 2050 target for an 80% reduction from 1990, in the Climate Change Act 2008.
However, this is only possible if clear, stable and well-designed policies to reduce emissions further are introduced across the economy without delay. Current policy is insufficient for even the existing targets.
Accordingly, on June 27 2019, the UK Government committed to a legally binding target to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
The freight context
Overlapping the production of the CCC report, in 2017 the UK Government asked the National Infrastructure Commission to advise on the move to a low-carbon national freight system.
In its report published on April 17 2019 (see Further Reading 6), the NIC reached the conclusion that “through the adoption of new technologies and the recognition of freight’s needs in the planning system, it is possible to decarbonise road and rail freight by 2050”, and that this would require “government to outline clear, firm objectives”.
The Commission also recommend that: “Road and rail freight should have a common, single target to decarbonise fully by 2050. No part of the freight system should be indirectly subsidised by being allowed to emit carbon when other parts are decarbonising.”
The NIC pointed out the challenges for rail freight decarbonisation, noting that all options are likely to be expensive and probably entail significant technical challenges.
It noted that the alternative - to transfer it to other modes, most likely road - would also be costly and would likely require significant new road infrastructure, which would entail its own significant cost and social consequences.
The rail decarbonisation challenge
On February 12 2018, then Rail Minister Jo Johnson called for the rail industry to take “all diesel-only trains off the track by 2040” and to propose “a clear, long-term strategy with consistent objectives and incentives” with “ambitious and bold plans on decarbonising the whole rail sector”.
In response, the rail industry set up the Rail Industry Decarbonisation Taskforce, chaired by Angel Trains Chief Executive Malcolm Brown and comprising representatives from the major parts of the rail industry - including Network Rail, the Rail Delivery Group, the Rail Freight Group, the Railway Industry Association, and RSSB.
The purpose of the Taskforce was to prepare a collective response to the challenge - including a route map to delivering the mission, which will embed delivery in business as usual. It was remitted to look at decarbonisation across all aspects of the railway - including traction, property (stations, depots and other buildings) and infrastructure.
The Taskforce published two reports, in January and July 2019 (see Further Reading 7), which were accepted by the Minister for Rail and have since formed the basis for the railway’s ongoing response to the climate challenge.
The Taskforce concluded that decarbonisation would be best achieved with a balanced and judicious mix of cost-effective electrification, coupled with the deployment of targeted battery and hydrogen technology.
The reports were published not long after controversies about the high and increasing costs of certain electrification projects on the GB railway effectively led to the cancellation or indefinite delay of some major electrification schemes. While this was not a factor in the objective assessment of the benefits of different low-carbon traction options, it was inevitable that their findings and recommendations would be seen in that light.
RIA believed that the reasons why some electrification schemes had significantly overrun against budgets were neither systemic nor inevitable. It published the Electrification Cost Challenge (see Further Reading 8) in March 2019, to illustrate (with examples from the UK and internationally) how the high costs seen on recent projects, including the Great Western Electrification Programme, might be avoided in the future.
One of the ways is to implement a consistent programme of electrification at a constant rate, rather than the boom and bust programmes seen in recent years. This, alongside effective planning and design before starting projects, would enable demand, supply and costs to be held in much better balance than had often been the case with recent projects and programmes.
