NEW DELHI: The Indian Railways (IR) claimed on Friday to have set a new benchmark in the electrification of rail routes while working steadily towards achieving net zero Carbon Emissions by 2030 to become the world’s largest Green Railway. An official statement said that its electrification drive aims to improve fuel energy usage, reduce fuel expenditures and save foreign exchange for the country.
“The railway has accomplished 81.51% electrification of the total broad gauge rail network, moving towards achieving the Net Zero Carbon Emission by 2023,” the Indian Railway claimed, adding that a long stretch of 851 km rail routes were electrified between April and September of outgoing 2022 alone.
Sharing details with this newspaper, a senior railway official said that the target for electrification during the current financial year is 6500 rail route kms, out of which 851 rail route kms have been electrified till September 30, 2022.
“As on September 30 this year, out of 65,141 rail route kms of broad gauge network, 53,098 kms have been electrified, which is 81.51% of the total broad gauge route,” claimed the IR in a statement.
The railway further added that a record electrification of 6,366 rail kms was done during 2021-22 as compared to 6,015 route kms electrified in 2020-21. In fact, the Indian Railway has set the target to electrify the entire length of broad gauge rail routes by 2023-24. Recently, its four zones out of a total 18, namely- the East Coast, South Eastern, Eastern and Central Eastern railways, are 100% electrified.
Sharing the news recently, Union MoS for railway Raosaheb Patil Danve said that 100% electrification of four zones was achieved in line with the railway’s aim of becoming the largest Green railways in the world. A senior railway official further said that the importance of electrification is all set to further increase in the next few years with the introduction of 400 Vande Bharat trains of new generation and the Vande Bharat-based’ Freight EMU’ services.