Britain's 25-year Environment Plan: the railway plays an important role

The British Government recently launched a 25 Year Environment Plan, setting out a route for the restoration of the natural environment within a generation. Conceived as a ‘living document’, the Government proposes to update the Plan at least every 5 years, to report annually on progress to Parliament, and to develop a set of indicators to monitor progress.

The Plan sets out a combination of new and existing strategies, targets, mechanisms and commitments in order to meet its goals, which include: 

o clean air

o clean and plentiful water

o thriving plants and wildlife

o reduced risk of harm from environmental hazards such as flooding and drought

o using resources from nature more sustainably and efficiently

o enhancing beauty, heritage and engagement with the natural environment

In addition, the Government intends to reduce pressure on the environment by:

o mitigating and adapting to climate change

o minimising waste

o managing exposure to chemicals

o enhancing biosecurity

What the 25 Year Environment Plan means for the rail industry

Railway is only mentioned in the Environment Plan once in the context of fly-tipping, with an important consequence of this waste crime being disruption caused to rail services. 

However, there is a lot the rail industry can do to support and enhance content of the Environment Plan and, with the right steer and level of engagement from Government, can deliver large-scale benefits for the environment, railway managers, railway users, and local communities.

Clean Air

Air pollution is high on the political agenda at present. For clean air, the Environment Plan aims to meet legally binding targets for emissions of five damaging air pollutants. As a result, the effects of air pollution should halve by 2030.

Rail transport makes up only around 2% of all domestic transport emissions and so can play an obvious positive role by enabling the switch of passengers and goods from much higher-emission road transport.

Government and industry can best deliver this environmental and economic benefit by prioritisation and effective implementation of electrification, expanding and modernising the existing network.

Some acute emissions own-goals should also be addressed. Bi-mode trains simply do not produce the same air quality benefits for passengers as an electrified train network. And too many railway stations are suffering from relatively high levels of diesel air pollution. Major railway stations with high numbers of diesel-operated trains include London Marylebone, Birmingham (New Street and Snow Hill), Manchester (Piccadilly and Victoria), Liverpool Lime Street, Sheffield, Leeds, Newcastle, Bristol Temple Meads and Cardiff (Central and Queen Street).

Research into air quality at a number of stations is in progress at Kings Cross, Euston, Edinburgh Waverley and Birmingham New Street stations. The outputs of these studies should lead to improved operational procedures and approaches to ventilation which benefit both the rail workforce and public health.

Plants and wildlife

Two key pledges are made in the Plan with regard to nature conservation. The first involves establishment of a Nature Recovery Network – restoration of 750,000 hectares of terrestrial and freshwater protected sites to favourable condition, as well as the creation of an additional 500,000 hectares of "wildlife-rich habitat" outside the protected network.

The Government believes this can underpin delivery of ecosystem services, which boost carbon capture, water quality, and flood management capabilities.

The concept of nature-based solutions is something that the rail industry should strongly support and play an integral part in delivery. New approaches to the management of railway landholdings and habitats could bring multifunctional benefits for the operation and resilience of the railway, for local communities, and for the natural environment.

For example, a new management approach to lineside vegetation , involving coppicing for woody vegetation and restoration of areas of grassland, could increase biodiversity, benefit pollinators and reduce the hazards associated with tree and leaf fall, as well as potentially providing a sustainable source of wood products for local communities.

With vastly improved digital mapping and geo-spatial information available, and with promise of a step-change to come, the railway can better take into account patterns of adjacent land use, and develop railway habitat management protocols that maximise the potential for linkages with the Nature Recovery Network.

The second pledge for nature involves establishment of an ‘environmental net gain’ principle for development, including infrastructure. Network Rail is already engaged with this principle and is pioneering an approach for major rail infrastructure projects. The project is exploring the business case for net gain, which should see business benefits delivered through the de-risking of infrastructure investment plans, increased infrastructure resilience, and enhanced quality of life for lineside neighbours.

However, the main mechanism of delivering net gain, biodiversity offsetting, is controversial due to uncertainties in delivering ecological outcomes. The railway therefore has an important role and duty to play going forward, as a net biodiversity gain pioneer, in shaping a robust set of principles, values and practices, and in closing gaps in our knowledge between theory and practice.

Reduce risk of harm from environmental hazards

A key aim of the Environment Plan is to make information on environmental risks and hazards as accessible as possible. Also mentioned is the boosting of "long-term resilience of our homes, businesses and infrastructure". What the boosts will be remains to be explained but any plan that helps the railway improve its resilience to the effects of climate change will be welcome.

The multifunctional benefits of a sustainable ‘green asset’ management approach, outlined above, can play a significant part in this - working with Government and neighbouring landowners, the right green infrastructure in the right place along our network can deliver multiple ecosystem services and enhance asset resilience, increase asset efficiency and performance and deliver an improved return on investment.

Using resources from nature more sustainably and efficiently

A key target in the Plan is given as "doubling resource productivity by 2050".

The railway is a significant consumer of materials and resources - millions of tonnes of ballast, railway sleepers (concrete, timber, composites), scrap iron and non-ferrous metal, and operational property waste (depots, stations, offices) are consumed or produced each year. 

Some excellent initiatives to use resource more efficiently are already in play. For example, ballast by weight and by volume is the largest component of railway track, and the cost of buying and distributing ballast is huge. Implementation of a High Output Ballast Cleaning System (HOBCS) has allowed Network Rail to reuse approximately 2.6 million tonnes of ballast over the past 10 years (as at 2017), providing both environmental and economic benefits. 

Innovation plays a pivotal role. For example, new polymers have been designed for use in the construction and maintenance of masonry arch railway bridges, of which there are more than 25,000 on the network. This material improves the structural integrity of a bridge increasing its lifespan and reducing natural resource use. 

Infrastructure materials management has potential to deliver considerable resource and CO2 emission savings. Network Rail now has a number of materials banks operating across Britain. These storage and recycling hubs are designed to help achieve material efficiency through enabling strategic deposits and retrieval, and thereby addressing timing and sequencing challenges that frequently come with re-purposing surplus materials within and between infrastructure projects.

The challenge going forward is for the industry to drive more processes and innovation which close the materials loop and move towards a more circular railway economy, especially in procurement and decommissioning of rail infrastructure.

The rail industry, and the wider GB plc., would therefore benefit from levers enabled by Government, which could be in scope for the 25 Year Plan - no specific British legislation exists to enact the circular economy and the prevailing economic model involves reliance on third parties changing their ways of working where an interface occurs with rail operations.

Enhancing beauty, heritage and engagement with the natural environment

The Plan outlines an aspiration to safeguard and enhance natural scenery and make sure there are accessible natural spaces close to where people live and work, with particular mention given to urban areas.

The railway network comprises some 50,000 hectares of land, with much of it green space. The visual envelope of the railway forms part of the experience of more than four million passenger journeys every day, and part of the daily lives of the five million homes either backing on to or facing the network.

Furthermore, our stations are gateways to the communities they serve, and can act as hubs for access to many green spaces and important wildlife areas the length and breadth of Britain.

There is a greater role for the railway to play in enhancing the urban and rural landscapes of Britain and this function and opportunity is intertwined with the opportunity to deliver a greener network and ecosystem services.

Managing exposure to chemicals

The Environment Plan sets out a commitment to eliminate the use of Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs) by 2025, in line with commitments under the Stockholm Convention. A number of railway assets contain PCBs, notably high voltage transformers, and the current policy is to monitor and dispose of these as soon as possible at the end of their useful life. 

Plastic waste is a very high-profile topic of discussion and a key target in the Plan is to eliminate avoidable plastic waste by 2042, with "avoidable" given the definition of "Technically, Environmentally and Economically Practicable".

The rail industry is a large producer of plastic waste both from infrastructure lifecycle activities and rolling stock operation. Going forward, the industry has a wide role to play in assessing and quantifying plastic waste from sources of generation, improving present practices of collection, transportation and disposal. The opportunity to reduce this waste stream is significant. Emerging opportunities include:

Plastic sleepers: the production of synthetic sleepers has the potential to enable large amounts of plastic waste material to be converted into a valuable product, rather than shipped for treatment or to landfill. 100% recyclable composite sleepers also promise performance and efficiency benefits - significantly less ongoing maintenance and a long operational life means a reduction in the total cost of track and savings which can be recycled to further project investments.

Water fountains: a project is in motion to introduce free water fountains at Managed Stations. Passengers will be encouraged to refill their own multiple use water bottles. This simple change will deliver a large environmental benefit by reducing single-use plastics, and also benefits the welfare of station users too. 

Coffee cups: Chiltern Railways is developing a template for the rest of the industry and providing customers with a way to reduce plastic coffee cups, a major constituent of waste generated by rail travel. A new process is being implemented to segregate, collect and reprocess coffee cup waste into a raw material for a range of functional recycled products.

Biosecurity

Important commitments to improving biosecurity are made in the Environment Plan. Priority workstreams include action to reduce the risk of introduction of invasive non-native species, and a campaign to increase awareness of the risks posed by invasive-non-native species. 

The 50,000 hectares of railway land harbours a wide range of invasive species and the network is potentially an important vector for their spread. The possibility for transport networks to facilitate the dispersal of a public health nuisance has recently been seen in the case of Oak Processionary Moth.

The rail industry can therefore plan a key role, in what is a never-ending battle, by establishing a practical biosecurity framework to minimise the risks of operational and project activities, which are extensive, introducing or spreading invasive pests and diseases.

By including lineside neighbours in the invasive species debate, the railway, and other land owners, could cultivate a rich vine of information about unhealthy trees, weeds and pests along the network. This intelligence could feed into industry and landowner vegetation management strategies and enable a proactive approach before an invasives problem establishes or spreads further.

Coupling environmental ambitions to delivery

The 25 Year Environment Plan sets out some strong ambitions. Realising those ambitions is becoming increasingly important, especially when placed in a context where 35% of the Government’s own environmental indicators are in long term decline. The key challenge is to convert these environmental ambitions into action, and establish robust governance and measures of progress.

Existing industry action and commitments already support the Environment Plan and the railway industry should welcome commitments to biodiversity net gain (cautiously), to doubling resource productivity by 2050, and to increasing the sustainability of land management. The rail industry can and should play an important part in coupling the carriages of the Government's environmental ambition to a delivery plan.

Views in this article represent the author’s personal opinions only.