Monday, December 12, 2011

boxcars better than trucks

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/12/111208173716.htm

Much of that impact boils down to simple efficiency, according to Erica Bickford, a graduate student in UW-Madison's Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies. For each ton they carry, long-distance trucks go about 150 miles on a gallon of diesel fuel. Trains can move a ton more than 400 miles per gallon.

Shifting from road to rail 500 million tons of the freight passing through or to the Midwest would make a large dent in the carbon dioxide spilled into the air by the movement of goods.

"There's a 31 percent decrease in carbon dioxide produced by freight shipping in the region, and that's straight from emissions," says Bickford, who made a model of freight traffic in 10 Midwestern states from Kansas to Ohio that she presented December 8 in San Francisco at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union. "It's 21 million metric tons of CO2, the equivalent of what's produced by about 4 million cars."

D - let's see if CN can remain relevant.

There was a nasty article in the G&M biz section a few weeks back. Talking about the total lack of accountability for where/when the package is compared to any courier service.

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