Re: Freight trains (was Re: Critical Mass)

[matthew@mail.usyd.edu.au (Matthew Geier)]

In article <36c509f8.427723@news.ozemail.com.au>,
Derek Woodlands <kingpin1@ozemail.com.au> wrote:
>'Twas a dark and stormy night on 12 Feb 1999 00:58:38 GMT as
> 
>The one hassle with electric rail is that you concentrate pollution in one area.
>That area is near the power plant itself.  Diesel power (either road or rail)
>may cause pollution, but it is diluted over a wide area.
>
 But there is also a converse - the thermal powerstations can be made
quite effcient and its easy to control the emissions from one big plant.
 A modern coal powerstation puts out CO2 and not much else. The soot is
traped, the exhaust 'scrubed' and the fuel/air mixture tightly controled.

 With 1000's of small diesels about, polution control is much harder, and
also scattered all over the country side - some area's this is good,
others (like cities) this is bad.

 Electric railways powered by Nuke plants would be be my favourite. Yes
Nuke plants produce nasty waste, but very little compared to the power
generated. We however seem to be happy to pour out huge quantities of
less toxic emissions from older 'fossil fuel technologies, but get
into a flap about small amounts of N-Waste.