User:Dscsd21/Amtrak

Amtrak Impact on Climate Change
Amtrak operates over thirty passenger train routes throughout the U.S. and Canada. The level of environmental pollution caused by the operation of these trains relies mainly on two factors: the type of train (passenger of freight) and the type of fuel that the train takes (electric or diesel). The kilometric tons of greenhouse gas emissions from passenger trains is larger than that of freight trains in many countries like the U.K. and the U.S., and can be up to double the amount of freight emissions, as seen in an early 2000s study of U.K. transportation based environmental impacts. Amtrak is a large passenger railroad company, and therefore will have increased pollution in relation too if their operations consisted of only freight. As for train fuel, Amtrak operates diesel, electric, and duel-mode(diesel and electric) locomotives. While diesel powered engines objectively produce more greenhouse gas emissions during operation than electric trains, it must be considered how the electricity was attained. For example, primary fuels to generate electricity can include: coal, natural gas, nuclear energy, and sustainable energy. As Amtrak electricity suppliers reduce the amount of fossil fuels that go into producing electricity, the further advantage of using electric trains over diesel trains on the environment will increase. As for the locational pollution directly from Amtrak operation, their diesel trains cause more regional air pollution, therefore impacting the ecosystems around the sites of operation. It can also be seen that more stops along train routes can lead to higher greenhouse gas emissions. In addition to this negative environmental impact, Amtrak rail facilities located in Delaware were cited as the state's largest source of PCB contamination into the Delaware River. This banned toxic chemical compound is used in electrical and hydraulic equipment, plastics, rubber products, pigments, and in many other industrial applications. These chemicals are insoluble in water and build up in the tissue of animals. This works its way up the food chain, contaminating animals and causing numerous adverse health effects. The Environmental Protection Agency also cited PCB's as human carcinogens.

Impact of Climate Change on Amtrak
The United States rail system is the largest in the world with over 140,000 miles of class one track. Amtrak operates trains on over 21,000 miles of these tracks every day. This leaves railways and surrounding infrastructure, like the ones owned by Amtrak, extremely susceptible to degradation by natural causes over time. With tracks in many different climates around the U.S., railways experience conditions like water damage, from climate change backed increases in rainfall in wet areas, and rail buckling, caused by hotter and dryer seasons in naturally dry areas. When more frequent severe weather storms like Hurricane Ida in 2021, caused by increased humidity, swept the East Coast, subways in New York City and Philadelphia were completely flooded. Amtrak is largely concentrated on the East Coast, and when Hurricane Ida hit, the United States' most congested rail corridor and one of the world's highest volume rail corridors, the Amtrak Northeast Corridor running from Boston to Washington D.C., flooded and was shut down for an entire day. In New York during this time, over seventy-five million gallons of water had to be pumped out of the subways. As climate change causes extreme weather in the United States to become more frequent and unpredictable, cities are being forced to opt for short term solutions to this problem, such as curbs at subway entrances or sea walls to avoid have to pump out more water from flooding events. According to the Regional Plan Association, over 400 subways are at high risk of being flooded over the coming decades due to the rise in global temperature and increase in variable storm patterns.

With summertime temperatures on the rise around the world, railway buckles are on the rise. A study conducted on the railways in the Southeast United Kingdom found that railway tracks are built to withstand a reasonable expected temperature range, but when temperature changes become extreme in the summertime due to climate change, the tracks buckle due to the outward force of the metal expanding in collaboration with the weight of train car traffic. This causes speed restrictions to be put in place around certain temperature intervals, therefore slowing travel time and lessening the amount of train rides in a day. The study found that in 2004, 30,000 delay minutes were attributed to increased heat causing a total of 1.5 million pounds, or over 1.7 million U.S. dollars, of total heat related delay cost. Heat related cost however, don't only come from the infrastructure itself, but also come from economic productivity loss from workers attributed to said heat. The combination of climate change induced increases in temperature and humidity in Miami alone have caused yearly losses in work productivity of ten billion dollars, and is predicted to double over the next three decades. This heat related production loss is compounded by the stress being put on the aging rail and highway infrastructure which is not designed to withstand temperatures this high in the United States. This has effected Amtrak directly with increased yearly cost having to be put into maintaining preexisting railways.