Originally Posted by
Sunnyjohn
Not sure what point you're making but I'll answer as best as I can. Humankind in the 21st century is energy-hungry and the only practical way to feed that hunger at present is energy produced by coal, oil, gas and nuclear fission. Ideally I would prefer energy to be produced from so-called sustainable sources but we do not yet have the technology to do so. Spain, where I live, produces 30 percent of its energy by this means but still requires 70 percent by conventional means. As a way of reducing energy consumption, savings can be made by, for example, travelling by train from Valencia to Madrid rather than by aircraft.
My point is that you cannot automatically assume that rail is 'greener' than air. If you take all the factors into consideration - how the energy is produced, the footprint of (at least) dual track on concrete sleepers (vs 2km of runway on each end), the cost (money and CO2) of creating the rail, the load factors, the cost (or value) of people's time, etc - in isn't a given that rail is better. In some cases yes, but in others (particularly when the rail journey is over 3 hours) no.