Transport for London (TfL) has partnered with digital twin startup Spinview to help clean up the tube and make it emission-free by 2030.
London Underground. Credit: Toms Auzins / Shutterstock
Sadiq Khan has vowed to make London's tube net-zero by 2030. Credit: Toms Auzins / Shutterstock
The project will allow for the latter's technology to help micromanage a number of key assets of the London Underground, digitally monitor tracks and tunnels and provide data on noise and heat levels and greenhouse gas emissions.
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Initially focusing on the Piccadilly Line, the tech should help drive London Mayor Sadiq Khan's ambitions for net-zero rail travel by the end of the decade. Spinview's budget has been allocated via the government's Smart Grid Grant to support the implementation of the digital twin.
The team hopes the technology will help meet sustainability targets while also ironing out any inefficiencies in the system that could not only help things run smoother but also cut costs and reduce other issues associated with the London Underground, such as air and noise pollution and heat management.
Spinview's Deep Rail Sensor maps out the geometry of the area and detects pollutants, which will also allow the Underground to monitor active emissions to track progress towards environmental goals.
The firm also claims the twin could reveal information hidden from the human eye, such as faults, heat hotspots or pinpointing the exact location of noise, which could be utilised by TfL to improve the customer's experience.
“This partnership offers us a really exciting opportunity to gain real-time access to our assets on the Underground network, many of which we can currently only inspect during engineering hours", said Paul Judge, the director of the Piccadilly Line Upgrade at TfL.
"Not only will using digital-twin technology support the smarter, more efficient maintenance of the railway, it will also enable us to more accurately monitor environmental challenges such as carbon emissions, noise levels and heat as we strive to do more to lessen our carbon footprint and help tackle the climate emergency".
Spinview also hopes the project will allow for TfL to manage more complex data sets through the entire lifecycle of the project. It could stand to lessen the burden on physical inspectors - traditional maintenance takes place between 1-5 am - as they could use the twin's interface to identify problems far more quickly and not have to rely entirely on antisocial working hours.
TfL has already taken measures to reduce the environmental impact of the Piccadilly line. Last March, the body partnered with Siemens to introduce a new fleet of trains to the line with plans to replace the existing fleet, which had been in action since the 1970s.
Read more: Siemens and Transport for London unveil new Piccadilly line trains
Aside from cleaning up the line, the new trains could also increase the number of services per hour, meaning a new train may arrive at a stop every 135 seconds. The team hopes the active number of trains on services will increase to around 27 per hour.
With more trains and more service, greater lengths will need to be taken to clean up the tracks, which is where the digital twin could shine.
“We are thrilled to support TfL in its ambitions to achieve a zero-carbon railway by 2030", said Spinview's CEO Linda Wade.
"By establishing a visually intelligent ecosystem for TfL, Spinview hopes to not only help TfL in tracking its environmental goals, but also to support in facilitating better decision-making, driving forward business efficiencies, saving costs and future-proofing the network in the long-term.”
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