Location
Europe
Company size
461
Industry
Target
Chiltern Railways, commits to become Net Zero by 2050, from its 2019 baseline year.
Chiltern Railways is a British train operating company owned by Arriva UK Trains. It operates commuter/regional rail passenger services from its central London terminus at London Marylebone along the M40 corridor to destinations in Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Warwickshire, as well as long-distance services to the West Midlands. The company does not have any prominent subsidiaries. As of 2022, it employs approximately 500 people.
As a train operator with a diesel only fleet, the management of our fuel use and air quality is particularly important to us. The railway lines Chiltern Railways operate over are not electrified and we are working closely with the Department for Transport on developing a fleet strategy which supports our commitment to sustainability and decarbonisation. We introduced the Driver Advisory System – DAS – to our fleet of trains to help reduce the amount of fuel we use on each journey.
The DAS device assists Train Drivers to identify when to coast, accelerate and brake to ensure the most efficient usage of fuel. We also have strict engine shut down policies at stations, helping to keep to an absolute minimum the amount of time that trains idle at stations whilst still ensuring they can provide a reliable service for customers. Chiltern Railways has partnered with Porterbrook and Angel Trains on two projects to install hybrid drive engines on our Class 165 and Class 168 trains.
We are working with our partners to produce one prototype of each class in order to assess the benefits of the technology. The Class 168 Chiltern HybridFLEX train has been fitted with a Rolls Royce MTU hybrid drive which will cut noise emissions in stations and deliver zero emissions when operating under battery power. Data suggests potential reductions of 20% in fuel consumption and circa 70% in NOx emissions on Chiltern services between London and Birmingham.
In addition to improved air quality and reduced noise, HybridFLEX units also expected to deliver journey time and route capacity improvements, as the combination of diesel and electric power will offer enhanced acceleration capabilities. The Class 165 Chiltern Hybrid Drive train is a collaboration with UK-based electric vehicles specialist Magtec and maintenance experts Loram and represents a £4m investment from Angel Trains in the technology. Immediate environmental benefits will include reducing carbon and gaseous emissions, as well as addressing local air quality issues and noise in populated areas.
The hybrid system automatically turns engines off and runs on battery when it detects proximity to stations and the regenerative braking system charges the vehicle, increasing overall efficiency.
In 2020 we launched our utilities group which meets each month to collate and analyse our utilities data and explore ways to reduce our usage. The group has increased the visibility of utilities data across the business, encouraging local teams to measure their usage rates against each other and has also implemented larger projects such as the roll out of energy efficient hand dryers across all stations and offices. In 2019 we installed LED lights across all of our stations and offices.
The energy efficient LEDs give an estimate reduction of our overall electricity consumption by 1,278,094 KWH’s per year compared to traditional bulbs, and a reduction of our CO2e output by over 600,000kg, the equivalent of travelling between Birmingham Moor Street and London 14,224 times! As well as reducing Carbon Dioxide emissions, the project brought benefits to our customers by making station environments safer with better lighting levels.
Since 2019 we have introduced recycling facilities on board our trains and at the majority of our stations, with consistent signage making it easy for customers to identify and use the segregated bins. We were also the UK’s first train operator to introduce coffee cup recycling stands for customers at Marylebone station. We worked with Simply Cups to install the dedicated bins which encourage customers to segregate their coffee cup waste into three categories: lids, liquids and cups.
The used cups are collected by Simply Cups who give them a second life by turning them into functional new products such as the rCup – the world’s first reusable cup made from recycled coffee cups. As well as striving to improve our recycling facilities, we are also always on the lookout for ways in which we can reduce our overall waste production, including projects such as introducing new energy efficient hand dryers at all locations to reduce the use of hand towels, working with suppliers to identify ways to reduce packaging and non-recyclable waste and promoting the use of digital tickets and smart cards to reduce the need for printed tickets.
