Railway mulls switching to LNG, electric engines from diesel

The Bangladesh Railway is planning to reduce dependency on diesel-run locomotives.

As part of the state-owned service provider's modernisation, the authorities are planning to introduce electric-, CNG- and LNG-run engines, Railway Minister Md Nurul Islam Sujon said on Tuesday while sharing his recent experience of visiting railways in some European countries.

Nurul Islam Sujon, along with a team, visited the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, France and Russia from 22 November to 25 December, where they saw the railway networks and exchanged views on railway network development.

At present, Bangladesh's railway system is totally diesel-dependent, while neighbouring India has almost converted a major portion of its trains into electric-run.

At the press briefing, Nurul Islam said G-volution and Xpronet of the UK and TransMashHolding (TMH) Company of Russia had proposed converting Bangladesh's existing diesel locomotives into dual fuel with CNG and LNG to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

"We asked them to submit a detailed proposal after conducting a feasibility study on the exiting engines," said Nurul Islam.

Talking about the present railway situation, the railway minister said, "It will take time to develop the railway network. Today's Chinese railway has not developed easily. Seventy years back their railway was in a similar state to what ours is now."

The minister also said they were going to open the Dhaka-Bhanga of Faridpur railway service by December 2022.

Secretary of the Ministry of Railways Dr Md Humayun Kabir, Director General of Bangladesh Railway Dhirendra Nath Mazumder, Additional Director General (Infrastructure) of Bangladesh Railway Md Quamrul Ahsan and other officials of the ministry and railway were at the briefing.