Finding the chase and cutting to it

Yesterday, on our second train of the day, the TGV from Lyon to Lille, there was a proud poster which I could read while queuing for the loo: using this train is by far the best way to travel to reduce the impact on the environment.

Indeed, https://www.sncf-voyageurs.com states that France’s electric trains cost 3g of CO₂ per km compared to 260g
of CO₂ per km a flight would have cost us.

Which was why we let the train take the strain. Here’s what the cost was.

Going there.

We live in Ipswich – one of the best things about that from an ecological point of view is that the trains to London are all electric. So our first leg, Ipswich to London was planned on being electric down the East Anglian line from Norwich to Ipswich – a distance of 103km. First bill is 309g of
CO₂. Plus the 3 miles the taxi took to Ipswich station = 141g.

Only it wasn’t. To be fair, I was gladdened by the taxi showing up and being electric – we should have been doing the whole journey as minimally impactful as possible. But we were scuppered at Ipswich, finding that all the trains had been cancelled due to a train taking out the powerlines and the power coupling on the train trying to pass underneath at the same time – thankfully no-one was hurt…

The advice was to travel to Cambridge then down to St Pancras – actually, great for us, as we were staying there over night. Thanks to delay, repay, more than cost effective. Only, those trains are not electrified: instead of 3g
of CO₂ per km, we’re now costing 106g per km and travelling much further than 103km: 71km from Cambridge to Ipswich and then the distance from Cambridge to St Pancras, another 76km – so that CO₂ cost is 15,582g (71+76 = 147km * 106) or 15.6kg!

Now a night in a hotel, and we can set off for the next 3 trains across France.

All electric to Lyon.

The Eurostar is electric to Lille, as was the TGV from Lille to Lyon. Going we had some long transfer times, but as we were taking it easy, that wasn’t an issue.

So, distance to Lille from St Pancras was 245km, so 735g Lille to Lyon is 556km, so that’s another 1,668g or 1.7kg of CO₂.

We then swap to a diesel train to do the last leg, again a diesel train: so 106g per km doing 132km, so the charge is 13,992g or 14kg in terms of CO₂.

So that ( 13,992 + 1,668 + 735 + 15,582 + 141)g from home to the alps. Not including the transfer bus (16km for 108g per km, so 1,728g), again diesel, from the station to our chalet, a grand total of 33,846g or 34kg of CO₂. For a holiday.

But this was better than us taking the car across the channel to the same location and significantly better than taking the plane, which would have been 260g per km, at 760km that would have been a whopping 197,600g or nearly 200kg. Driving down would have been around 100kg.

What about the big cost: time? What did it cost you in terms of time?

So, including transfer times, we travelled from 5:30am Saturday morning to 19:30 local time – so 11hours.

And you did it all in one go coming back?

Yes, we did, but that is a different tale!