Russia Announces 400km/hr FREIGHT TRAIN to China

[Klause]

I know I'm posting a bunch tonight....

But I am tied into and have contact with a lot of people world wide... involved in grain trade, logistics, and other "projects"... A black book full of contacts, which give a lot of insight into what's happening world-wide... I've become fairly pessemistic on here (as ya'll have probably noticed ha ha) but there are many reasons for it, and I'm starting to share some.


http://www.globalconstructionreview.com/news/russia-announces-400kmh-frei7ght-tr7ain-mos7cow/

Russia and China have agreed to launch their first jointly developed high-speed freight train in 2019.

The announcement was made by Alexander Misharin, first vice president of Russian Railways, at the Strategic Partnership 1520 forum in Sochi on Thursday, 8 June. He said: “The technical requirements for this special rolling stock are about to be completed, and together with our Chinese colleagues we planned to launch it in 2019.”

Misharin said the train would be used to move perishable goods, and would be able to move them at a top speed of 400km/h.

A number of companies are working on the project, including Russian investment group Sinara, Siemens and Chinese train maker CRRC.

They may launch the production of the new train at the Ural Locomotives enterprise, which is a joint venture of Sinara and Siemens formed at the site of the former Ural Rolling Stock Manufacturing Plant in 2010.

One of the lines that the train will use is the $16.9bn high-speed link between Moscow and Kazan, which is due to be completed in 2022. The aim is to extend this 770km line to China, creating the first high-speed standard gauge link between the two countries.

China plans to extend a $6.2bn 20-year loan to Russia to pay for the infrastructure, and has also made a $1.9bn contribution to the equity capital of the train development project.

The time of travel between Moscow and Kazakhstan would be cut from 14 hours to about three.

Mr Misharin also signalled Moscow’s interest in electrifying the 600km Iranian rail line between Tehran and Tabriz, in the north of country. This would follow on from the recently completed electrification of the Tehran to Inche Burun, at a cost of $1.3bn.

According to Iranian news agency PressTV, the project will include 32 stations and 95 tunnels and will be financed from the $5bn credit line for infrastructure projects agreed between the two countries. Russian state lender Vnesheconombank will grant another $2.1bn loan on top of that.

The project is set to begin next year and to take three years to complete.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Trying to understand how this makes any economic sense. The 770 km long high speed rail line between Moscow and Kazan is projected to cost $17 billion, on flat and level ground. Moscow to Beijing is 10 times as far, with mountains and borders, to cross. So at least $170 billion to build the entire line. Total Russian agricultural exports are $7.07 billion per year. Source: https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/country/rus/ https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/country/rus/

China currently takes 10% of all Russia's exports. Source :
http://www.worldstopexports.com/russias-top-import-partners/ http://www.worldstopexports.com/russias-top-import-partners/

If ag is proportionate, then 10% of 7 billion is 0.7 billion to China. Of which an even smaller percent would be perishable ag commodities. So they are going to build a $170 billion high speed railway to export a few million per year of perishable ag commodities to China? Perishable things like fruits and vegetables from a cold country with winter and mostly low rainfall to a warmer wetter country?

All to be paid for by a country reliant on commodities during an extended commodity price slump(back into recession now), and financed by a country with an unsustainable debt bubble. Anyone else see any problems with the numbers?

In fact, total exports to China are $28 billion, the vast majority of that is oil and gas ($28 billion in 2014, falling ever since with falling energy prices). Which can travel by pipeline. Roughly $10 billion of non oil and gas to China per year now, So if every other industry shipped all of its goods to China by high speed rail, and transportation costs are 20% of their value (guess), then it will only take 85 years to pay for the infrastructure to ship it, assuming there are no operational costs along the way, which of course there are.


We took Sapsan, the high speed passenger train between Moscow and St. Petersburg last summer. Max speed 250km/h. Very impressive, no stops on sidings, smooth, quiet, never guessed you were going that fast if not for the speedometer in every wagon. 400km/h is a substantial jump from 250km/h. Everything would have to be aerodynamic, how do you make freight cars aerodynamic, especially when the loads may be different shapes every time(thinking of lumber for example)? All freight would need to be offloaded from a regular speed train onto the specialized high speed train wagons, adding additional cost.

[Marusko]

AF5,

You make some good points. But the goods that would travel on this rail would certainly not be limited to perishable agricultural goods. I can't quantify it, but surely there are various other goods that would use this rail.

You're also not counting the potential for future trade. The first article that comes up when I googled "russia china trade" states that 2016 trade between the two amounted to $70bn in 2016 (Presumably this is US$??) and the two countries have set a goal to boost trade to $200bn by 2020. wow.

Another way to look at it: US-China trade in 2017 amounted to $577bn (imports and exports) from https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html. If Russia traded the same per capita with China as the US does, Russia-China would amount to $260bn.

Finally, I would bet that there is some military strategy in here too. If Russia and China want to cozy up and cooperate militarily, a high speed rail would help one defend the other. Cooperation is already happening.

[bucket]

The sarcastic part of me says **** it....let's allow the railways in North America to continue to consolidate and do SFA to help get our products exported....let's just truck our grain to Vancouver. ...

While other countries embrace the efficiency of rail from both environmentally and economically we sit back and give them the free pass to do little...

Today we have the ability to start vehicles from anywhere with a cell phone.....meanwhile trains are still blowing up and hitting one another because no one wants to adapt new technology...

The latest amtrak crash had the freight train off line but the switch hadn't been positioned properly....a cell phone Bluetooth link from a double safety switch could have sent a warning....


Let's not build SFA ....the railways can stay in the 60s....that their competence level...

Meanwhile other countries will...

Just ****ing pisses me off the lack of desire in this country to do better....but smoke dope....ffs

[AlbertaFarmer5]

AF5,

You make some good points. But the goods that would travel on this rail would certainly not be limited to perishable agricultural goods. I can't quantify it, but surely there are various other goods that would use this rail.

You're also not counting the potential for future trade. The first article that comes up when I googled "russia china trade" states that 2016 trade between the two amounted to $70bn in 2016 (Presumably this is US$??) and the two countries have set a goal to boost trade to $200bn by 2020. wow.

Another way to look at it: US-China trade in 2017 amounted to $577bn (imports and exports) from https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html. If Russia traded the same per capita with China as the US does, Russia-China would amount to $260bn.

Finally, I would bet that there is some military strategy in here too. If Russia and China want to cozy up and cooperate militarily, a high speed rail would help one defend the other. Cooperation is already happening.

There would be other freight that would use the rail line, and passengers. But with the exception of perishables, and people, nothing else would benefit from high speed. Iron ore doesn't have a shelf life.
Just saying that I think it is a pipe dream, and reality will get in the way of it actually happening.

[Guest]

sad , really sad . most can't see the damage and steps backwards .