As part of efforts to curb operational costs, reduce carbon emissions and bring down cost of maintenance of locomotives, the federal government has announced that the retrofitting of the Nigerian Railway Corporation’s (NRC’s) locomotives to dual-retrofit engines is at advanced stage.
The Minister of Transportation, Sen. Said Alkali, made the disclosure during an on-the-ground visit to the NRC’s locomotive workshop at Idu – Abuja to appraise the retrofitting exercise.
According to a statement on Tuesday by Muhammad Tahir Zakari AD (Press & PR) in the Ministry, Alkali explained that the process which started a month ago, was currently at an advanced stage, adding that if successful, it will bring down the cost of maintenance to about 60 to 70 percent and curtail carbon emissions, given the fact that once the locomotive moves to gas, there won’t be gas emissions.
Speaking on behalf of the Federal Government, Alkali said the retrofitting will enable the engine work on a dual fuel, saying Nigeria is the first in African continent, to retrofit locomotive from diesel to gas. ” The engine is going to work 30 percent on diesel, and 70 percent on gas”.
“At the time you want to start the locomotive, you use diesel. But when you have done the starting, it will switch over to gas and keep moving”. Alkali stated.
“We started in the last one month. We have come to see where the process is so far, and interface with the engineers.The process is already at an advanced stage and we are going to test-run the engine tomorrow and this will determine when the system will be fully deployed on the commercial routes.
Speaking further, the Minister revealed that the process will be beginning with the Abuja-Kaduna rail corridor, given that the workshop for the retrofitting is in Abuja. Thereafter, they will move to all other rail corridors.
Recall that following a proposal by De-Sadel consortium to the Ministry on its ability to retrofit diesel engines to LNG/CNG models, the Minister directed the constitution of a technical evaluation committee to monitor the process.
