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New Delhi : Railways Ministry, with a goal of transforming Indian Railways into Green Railways by 2030, has taken a number of major initiatives towards mitigation of global warming and combating climate change. Railway Electrification, improving energy efficiency of locomotives & trains and fixed installations, green certification for installations/stations, fitting bio toilets in coaches, and switching over to renewable sources of energy are parts of its strategy of achieving net zero carbon emission.
Indian Railways has completed electrification of more than 40,000 Route km (RKM) (63% of BG routes) in which 18,605 km electrification work has been done during 2014-20. Previously, only 3,835 km electrification work was completed during the period 2009-14. The Railways has fixed a target of electrification of 7,000 RKM for the year 2020-21. All routes on BG network have been planned to be electrified by December 2023. A 365 km major connectivity work has been commissioned during COVID period.
Major connectivity commissioned during COVID period like Katni-Satna section (99 RKM) of Mumbai-Howrah via Allahabad route has been commissioned providing an alternate route to Howrah. Likewise, Pachore-Maksi (88 RKM) section on Indore – Guna-Bina route has also been commissioned providing an alternate route to Maksi-Bhopal-Bina.
On Howrah/Sealdah-SVD Katra via Patna route, Bhagalpur-Shivnarayanpur (45 RKM) section has been commissioned. On the route connecting Kariakal port to coal, fertiliser and steel plants of Tamil Nadu & Andhra Pradesh, Thiruvarur – Karaikal port (46 RKM) section has been commissioned providing port connectivity to Erode, Coimbatore & Palghat, according to a PIB release.
Indian Railways has also taken a number of initiatives to promote solar energy. It is working to harness the potential of 500 Mega Watt (MW) energy through rooftop Solar panels (Developer model). Till date, 100 Mega Watt (MW) of solar plants have been commissioned on rooftops of various buildings including 900 stations. Solar plants with a combined capacity of 400 MW are under different stages of execution. Tenders are already awarded for 245 MW and target for completion of these plants is December 2022.
Besides this, Indian Railways is trying to produce power from land Based Solar installations for running trains. It has 51,000 hectare of land potential of installing 20 GW land based solar plants. The Solar power so generated will be fed to Central / State Grid or directly to 25 kV AC traction system. Railway Energy Management Company Limited (REMCL), a Joint Venture Company of Indian Railways (49 % Equity) and RITES Limited (51 % Equity), has been mandated for proliferation of taking up land based project.
One project of 1.7 MW at Bina (Madhya Pradesh) in collaboration with Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) has already been installed and is presently under extensive testing. This is first of its kind of solar project in the world.
In the wind energy sector, 103 MW wind-based power plants have already been commissioned. Among them, 26 MW is in Rajasthan (Jaisalmer), 21 MW is in Tamil Nadu and 56.4 MW is in Maharashtra (Sangli). Railways has also planned to set up 200 MW wind energy plants in next 2 years in Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Rajasthan, and Karnataka.
Realising its role in climate change, Railways has started other Green Initiatives like 100 per cent LED illumination of buildings and stations. It has also acquired Green Certification from CIII to 7 Production Units (PUs), 39 Workshops, 6 Diesel sheds and 1 Stores depot. Fourteen Railway Stations and 21 other buildings/ campuses have also been Green certified.
Total 505 pairs of trains have been converted to Head on Generation(HOG), unleashing approx 70 million liter diesel/ Rs 450 crore per annum potential of saving. Energy Efficiency Studies of all 8 Production Units & 12 workshops have been completed under an MoU with CII resulting in 15% improvement in energy efficiency. In the field of Green Initiatives, a total of 69,000 coaches have been fitted with more than 2,44,000 bio-toilets.