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Electric Bills

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deltic1989

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Apologies if this has come up before. I did try to search but didn't find anything to answer my particular question.

I was sitting in traffic earlier today and saw a Virgin Pendo go rushing by, and my curiosity was piqued and I'm sure that one of the resident experts here can satisfy it.

My question is threefold:

How much roughly does it cost for a Pendolino set to complete 1 round trip Euston-Glasgow and back?

Who is the electricity supplier? Is it an outside agency or do NR act as the supplier.

Assuming an outside agency supplies the power who picks up the bill? If it is the TOC then how are the bills calculated?

Ok so maybe more than threefold and, I realise that it is a pretty noobish question but I have never been curious about it until now.

Many thanks in advance for helping me to satisfy my curiosity.
 
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Eagle

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Who is the electricity supplier? Is it an outside agency or do NR act as the supplier.

Assuming an outside agency supplies the power who picks up the bill? If it is the TOC then how are the bills calculated?

I'm not sure who the supplier is, but NR will pay the supplier for electricity, and Virgin will pay NR for using the electricity (along with the track access obviously).

I think NR might apply a markup—fair enough being as they own all the electrical infrastructure and everything.
 

transmanche

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I'm not sure who the supplier is, but NR will pay the supplier for electricity, and Virgin will pay NR for using the electricity (along with the track access obviously).

I think NR might apply a markup—fair enough being as they own all the electrical infrastructure and everything.
I believe they're moving to on-board metering.

I assume they don't have someone calling round to read the meter and leaving a 'you were out' card! :D
 

LNW-GW Joint

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My question is threefold:

How much roughly does it cost for a Pendolino set to complete 1 round trip Euston-Glasgow and back?
Who is the electricity supplier? Is it an outside agency or do NR act as the supplier.
Assuming an outside agency supplies the power who picks up the bill? If it is the TOC then how are the bills calculated?

Ok so maybe more than threefold and, I realise that it is a pretty noobish question but I have never been curious about it until now.
Many thanks in advance for helping me to satisfy my curiosity.

EDF is (or soon will be) the supplier of electricity to Network Rail for traction purposes, having won a recent tender.
NR buys the power from EDF and then resells it to the TOCs under a contract known as EC4T (electric current for traction).
The way the bills are calculated seems to be as complicated as Newton's Laws of Gravitation, requiring numerical integration to give you a number :(

The NR contract for the TOCs was actually referenced yesterday on the forum talking about a class 350/2 being tested by TPE on the WCML: (post 14 in this thread http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=87384)

http://www.networkrail.co.uk/browse...emental agreement - ec4t billing 26-07-13.pdf

4 Traction Electricity Charge
4.1 For the purposes of paragraph 1, the term Et means an amount in respect of the
Traction Electricity Charge in Relevant Year t, which is derived from the
following formula:
Et = Etmo + Etme + EtmuAC + EtmuDC
where:
Etmo means an amount calculated in accordance with paragraph 4.1.2 below;
Etme means an amount calculated in accordance with paragraph 4.1.3 below;
EtmuAC means an amount calculated in accordance with paragraph 4.1.4(a) below;
and
EtmuDC means an amount calculated in accordance with paragraph 4.1.4(b) below.

Basically there are different charging rates in different areas, different formulas for AC and DC, and different rates for each train type.
It also seems that NR is moving to a metering system with power consumption measured by each train rather than a blanket charge per train type/area/mode.

Sorry I don't know the answer to your first question. It would be interesting to know the answer. :)
I suppose the next question is how this compares with the diesel fuel bill for a Voyager on the same run.
 

edwin_m

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Somewhere on the ORR website is a list of all the power consumption rates applicable to different units with different duties, and the prices per unit of electricity charged by Network Rail. These are applied to trains with no metering based on computer modelling of typical duties, but subject to a periodic "wash-up" where the difference (positive or negative) between the amount of power actually used and the amount the model said should have be used is shared out among all the users.
 

Trog

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In Retirement.
Do you remember how all the firemen disappeared at the end of steam in the late 1960's?

They were all transfered to those lineside buildings next to neutral sections and power feed in points. Whats more they are still there, it used to be a nice easy job for men used to shovelling tons of coal, but these days they are frantically shovelling 5p bits into huge coin fed electric meters. If you stand by one of those buildings when an electric price rise is announced, you will often hear a cry of anguish from the inhabitant.
 
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