A long-term shift in attitudes around climate change, travel, and work triggered by the Covid-19 pandemic could serve to significantly curb aviation growth in the next decade
RAIL INVESTMENT POST COVID-19
1. Investment to ‘make rail the core element of the European transport system’ should be an intrinsic part of the EU’s plans for stimulating economic recovery after the Covid-19 pandemic, according to rail sector associations CER and UNIFE.
2. As Europe has suffered under the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, railways have stepped up to provide essential services to the population, while at the same time bearing the considerable financial impact of the collapse in regular passenger and freight numbers.
3. EU investment in rail infrastructure would reassure passengers, as well as encouraging further public and private financing.
4. Rail freight companies have proved their strength in offering efficient cross-border cargo connections for large volumes of goods using minimal human resources’ during the crisis, the associations emphasise that ‘investing in the right resources and technologies to maximise infrastructure capacity will help rail freight achieve its true potential’.
5. From the supply chain perspective, ‘European rail manufacturers have continued to work at their best to provide the technology and innovation necessary to get through the socio-economic storm provoked by Covid-19. Safeguarding the global competitiveness of the European rail supply industry will ensure that the digital and innovation uptake of rail transport continues to advance’.
6. Highlighting the potential environmental benefits of shifting more freight to rail, as well as ‘co-ordinated investment in direct city-to-city rail connections’, which could attract passengers away from ‘other highly-polluting modes’, the associations believe that ‘the EU should not be looking to return to the status quo, with all its accompanying environmental impacts.
UBS RESEACH
1. A report published by UBS Research suggests that many travellers will switch from air to high speed rail in the post Covid-19 period.
2. The report found that consumers and governments were becoming ‘more climate aware’, with the Covid-19 outbreak revealing in industrialised countries ‘what clean air means’.
3. Using data from the European Union, aviation represented about 2∙5% to 3% of global emissions, but around 15% of transport-related emissions.
4. In 2017, transport generated 4 483 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent, with road transport responsible for 73% of greenhouse gas emissions, aviation generating 14%, maritime 13∙5% and rail about 0∙5%.
5. Noting that most governments in developed countries had set targets for net-zero carbon emissions by 2040 or 2050, therefore expect an acceleration in the shift from planes to high speed rail in both Europe and China’.
6. Governments would ‘pursue the expansion of high speed rail’, with more than €100bn being invested in the European Union and more than 800bn yuan spent in China, generating ‘incremental demand for new equipment to boost speeds and density’.
7. Revenue opportunities’ worth €40bn to €60bn in Spain, France, Germany and Italy over the next 10 years. This could slow global air traffic growth to 4∙6% a year over the 2018-28 period, they believed, although ‘every player is exposed in the air travel, rail and auto sectors’.
8. Data from a UBS Evidence Lab survey of 1 000 people in four European countries and China suggested that leisure travellers would tolerate 5 to 6 h on a train and that business travellers in the EU would accept up to 4 h compared with a general consensus of 2 to 3 h.
10. Service and frequency are key drivers of demand for longer train journeys, and ‘both can be improved when competition among operators is introduced’.
ASIA-EUROPE FREIGHT TO RAIL
1. The impact of Covid-19 will push many shippers to rethink their supply chains, and that could well see a lot more Asia-Europe air and ocean freight traffic moving permanently to the rail freight option.
2. The weekly service uses rail from Xi’an to Duisburg in Germany. Containers are then trucked under bond to Rotterdam and transported by ferry to Purfleet, for road transport to Davies Turner’s distribution centre where they are discharged, customs cleared and the goods delivered.
3. While air freight and ocean freight shipments face significant capacity and schedule issues, the first consol container that left China after it restarted the direct Express China Rail service into the UK in March arrived and was unpacked at the Dartford freight hub after just 17 days
Source:
https://www.railwaygazette.com/freight/covid-19-could-push-more-asia-europe-freight-to-rail/56244.article
https://www.railwaygazette.com/policy/ubs-predicts-post-pandemic-shift-from-air-to-high-speed-rail/56195.article
https://www.railwaygazette.com/policy/rail-investment-is-vital-to-post-covid-19-recovery-say-associations/56323.article
