Southern Railway’s Green Energy Push: Saves 600 Million Units Of Power And Offsets 5.8 Lakh MT Carbon

In line with the mission to establish 30 GW of renewable energy generation capacity by Indian Railway to attain a net-zero emission target by 2030, Southern Railway has been taking several steps o­n many fronts to achieve the above mission.

At present, 2.1 per cent of the Southern Railway’s total energy requirements, both traction and non-traction, are met through renewable energy sources.

Southern Railway (SR) has achieved energy savings of 570 million units in the traction category and 18 million units in the non-traction category during 2020-21.

This energy savings has offset CO2 emission by 5,88,000 metric tonnes and saving Rs 377 crore.

Under mission for 100 per cent Electrification of routes, SR has added 370 track kilometres during 2020-21.

Also, the total holding of electric locomotives has increased to 568, and diesel locomotives have reduced to 120, resulting in the saving of vast quantities of diesel besides the efficient running of trains.

According to a press release from the Southern Railway, it has installed 4.9 MW of Solar energy and 10.5 MW of windmill plants leading to annual energy generation of 4.07 and 26 million units, respectively.

In addition to the above measures, Southern Railway is working towards increasing the capacity of solar plants and has planned for the installation of 109 MW solar plants in its vacant land of about 288 acres.

Of this 288 acres of land, tenders have been floated by REMCL (Railway Energy Management Company Ltd) for 119 acres of land area. REMCL is processing tenders for 169 acres of land along the track.

SR is also progressing fast o­n electrification of routes and is expected to complete 100 per cent electrification by 2023.