How to invent problems

Stefan RoseanuThe end of May 2011 marked a new meeting of the transport ministers at the prestigious International Transport Forum. Organised under the aegis “Transport for Society”, the meeting was aimed at reinforcing an already classical message for the transport politicians: the solution to climate change and pollution is to adopt the electric vehicle on a large scale. Next to extending pedestrian routes and bicycles lanes (without an obvious connection with public transport), the electric vehicle seems to be considered a cure-all.
It seems that such an approach coming from the civil society and the international political class doesn’t  take into account several obvious aspects. First of all, the additional consumption of power that national networks should support. Should I refer to the country I know best, Romania, the electric vehicle, used at large scale, can constitute a threat to energy security, as well as a polluting factor. With a monthly average consumption of almost 90 Kwh/month, each residence should accept a new consumer of around 500-600 Kwh/month (at least these are the official figures considered necessary to recharge the batteries of electric vehicles). Without calculating consumption peaks (and there are enough areas, especially rural, where exceeding 6 Kwh is not accepted), the network should support a demand growth 5-6 times higher considering the fact that in Romania, as in many other countries, there are times in a year when energy production is insufficient (China imposes restrictions to energy distribution in the current consumption scenario). But let just say that the above scenario is just a bad dream which could be easily overcome. Currently, public authorities dispose of an extended railway network only partially electrified according to latest statistics. Although the stress falls on creating new electric consumers and identifying resources for building the necessary networks to supply them, nobody is actually taking a step forward towards extending the railway electric transport network and giving up diesel traction at least in this transport activity where alternatives do exist. Similarly in the urban public transport, the mirage of gas supply has determined many authorities to turn their back to electric public transport (tram or trolley). And we are dreaming at the system of electric vehicles which interact?
To conclude this humble divagation in the area of electric traction and its production, the same public authorities are competing to promote renewable electric production systems that block lands or private buildings. At the same time, it hasn’t come to my knowledge that any European or non-European country has actually decided to use public buildings (railway stations total thousands of hectares) to install photovoltaic panels or other energy sources.
As long as we don’t use the resources we dispose of, what good are the subsidies wasted on different programmes?
The railways is such a resource…

by Ştefan Roşeanu


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