How much air pollution do train engines cause?

Question

How much air pollution do train engines cause?

Answer 1

Well they are diesel find out how big the engine is and the emissions and you will find the answer

Answer 2

Diesel locomotives create pollution, though not as much as it would be if all the passengers or freight were transported in road vehicles.

Steam locomotives exhaust the products of coal, oil or wood combustion along with the steam. Again the pollution is not as much as it would be if the steam train's cargo or passengers went by road.

With an electric train there is no pollution from the train itself but possibly from the power source, e.g. if the power station is coal or gas-fired but not if it is hydro-electric as most of them are in e.g. Switzerland.

Answer 3

A locomotive engine produces alot of emissions,,,but when you factor in the amount of product they haul,,,,,,thats a lot of semi trucks taken off the road,,,so in actual fact its a very efficient way of moving product.(one locomotive equals 200 semi's or more)

Answer 4

In the days of steam, there were "no smoke" ordinances in many towns, which put pressure on the fireman to fire his boiler so it didn't make smoke.

They did nothing until the 1990's to clean up diesel locomotive emissions.   Now the industry is seriously geared up to reduce pollution -- going to new technologies like electronic (not mechanical) fuel injection, and even hybrid technologies!  Emissions may doom the famous EMD 2-cycle diesel.

As said, we're dealing with a different kind of smog.  Gasoline engines emit mostly HC and CO, but because diesels run lean, they emit NOx and particulates (smoke).   Fuel is changing too.  In the 1970s, lead was removed from gasoline, and in 2007, sulfur is being removed from diesel fuel.   Both were there for a reason - to lubricate the engine. Fortunately for diesels, there is a superb substitute - biodiesel!  Even 5% biodiesel lubricates engines better than sulfur ever did.

Speaking of biodiesel, railroads are in a superb position to use biofuels.  Notably, because locomotive engines run 24x7 and are rarely started except in a shop, they could be easily modified to run "straight vegetable oil" - regular old corn or soybean oil.  CostCo sells it in 5-gallon fryer packs for $2.60/gal.  It has the same energy volume as diesel, so you see it's nearly competitive with diesel fuel today.

Spills of 100% biofuel are non-toxic. (blended biofuels are as toxic as whatever they're blended with, which is why E85 is hazmat.)  And the emissions are believed to be less toxic as well.

Answer 5

As stated above, the amount of air pollution per ton/mile traveled is minimal, with an added benefit that diesel exhaust tends to settle to the ground.

Ground pollution is much more of a problem.  Grease, crater (a heavy gear box lubricant) fuel, dyed cooling water, oil and curve lubricators really dump a lot of stuff along the way.

These days service facilities are almost always equipped with drip pads, and there are some places where an oil absorbent fabric is laid before ballast, ties and rail are installed.

Even though the rock ballast is an excellent filter, very much the same as is used in residential septic systems, it doesn't do much to filter the lubricants and fuel spills.

Answer 6

Very little compared to alternative methods (e.g.road transport) to do the same work.