OMAHA, Nebraska Over the next three years, Union Pacific will spend more than $1 billion upgrading 600 of its outdated diesel locomotives to increase their efficiency, but regulators still want it to do more to reduce engine pollution.The action will hasten the speed of improvements that UP already intended to implement and aid the railroad based in Omaha, Nebraska in reducing about 210,000 tons of carbon emissions annually, or the equivalent of taking 45,000 automobiles off the road. In each of the following three years, the railroad will modernize 200 locomotives, up from 120 this year.According to Grace Olsen, who is responsible for Union Pacific's locomotive engineering, "it's essentially taking the older locomotive fleet and applying the latest and greatest to obtain one of the most fuel efficient locomotives we can have."
According to the railroad, this effort will increase these long-haul locomotives' fuel efficiency by up to 18% and improve the reliability of their peak power output. To do this, Wabtec, the maker of locomotives, will disassemble the locomotives, refurbish their engines over the course of eight weeks, and install new software and electrical controls.
Union Pacific will be able to move the same amount of freight with fewer locomotives thanks to the increased power. This will enable Union Pacific to retain more of its 7,400 locomotive fleet in storage, in addition to the railroad's plans to dramatically lengthen its trains. As part of the operational improvements it has made over the previous few years, UP has already parked hundreds of locomotives.
Wabtec claims that this UP project represents the largest single investment in the modernization of locomotives in railroad history, despite the fact that other significant freight railways are also upgrading their fleets. In order to have more than 950 contemporary locomotives by the end of 2025, Norfolk Southern said earlier this year that it will update 330 of its 3,200 locomotives over the following three years. After completing the project, UP will have 1,033 modernized locomotives.Gina Trombley, chief commercial officer at Wabtec, said that it basically boils down to taking an existing asset and giving it a technology boost so that it is maximized for the next 20 years of its life.
In addition to boosting its usage of biodiesel and other renewable fuels to 20 percent of its fuel use, UP claims that these locomotive renovations are a key component of its strategy to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 26 percent from 2018 levels by 2030. 20 battery-powered locomotives will be purchased by the railroad to test out in its railyards starting in 2019. However, according to UP officials, the technology won't be ready for broad usage for at least a few more years.
Because each train can carry the amount of freight that would require hundreds of trucks to transport, UP and the other big freight railroads like to brag about how much more efficient they are than trucks. Railroads are responsible for about 2% of all greenhouse gas emissions from transportation, according to the EPA, even though they transport 40% of the raw materials, completed commodities, and imported items that industries need. Almost 80% of the emissions from railroads are caused by locomotives.
The reduction in carbon emissions is welcome, but regulators with the California Air Resources Board, who have led the nation in efforts to regulate locomotive pollution, would like to see Union Pacific concentrate more on reducing its particulate matter and nitrous oxide emissions, which are linked to increased cancer risks and other health problems, particularly heart disease.
Diesel exhaust is made up of microscopic particles that can get deep within the lungs and carry a number of pollutants that have been related to heart attacks, cancer, lung disease, and other illnesses.
"What we're talking about today is more GHG (greenhouse gas) focused, which we think is important, but it's a secondary impact when we talk about reducing freight emissions at ports and railyards and their related health impacts for communities," said Cari Anderson, who is in charge of the California agency's locomotive regulations.
Instead of refurbishing locomotives that were purchased about 30 years ago and using them for many more years, regulators would prefer to see Union Pacific invest in new locomotives that can comply with today's stricter environmental rules.
According to Anderson, California wants freight railways to replace every locomotive in their fleet with Tier 4 locomotives, which can reduce the risk of cancer by 90%, or with zero-emission locomotives like the ones that UP is testing that are powered by batteries. Currently, only around 5% of the locomotives operated by Union Pacific in the state are Tier 4 compliant.
The 1990s-era locomotives, according to Union Pacific, can only achieve the lower Tier 2 requirement set by the EPA. The railroad stated that the modifications being made to these locomotives should help reduce some of the emissions of nitrous oxide and particulate matter, but it did not have a projection for how much those emissions will improve.
One of the biggest railroads in the country, Union Pacific has a network of 32,400 miles (52,000 kilometers) of track in 23 Western states.
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