Driving on innovation rather than diesel

Quite simply, it is THE sector that emits the most CO2, ahead of agriculture and industry. This is due to the combustion-powered car, which accounts for 60% of its emissions, compared with the train, which only accounts for 2%.

BUT, our good carbon performance doesn't prevent us from working ever harder to reduce our impact, particularly on our biggest CO2 emitter: traction and the energy it uses.

SNCF is France's biggest consumer of electricity, used in particular for its trains. The most obvious solution is therefore to use renewable energy: by 2030, we're aiming for 50% of our electricity to come from renewable sources.

But in the family of alternative energies, we have explored many other solutions , and have selected 4 that are realistic, effective in terms of carbon performance, deployable over the more or less long term, and have been on trial for several years. Biofuel from the co-products (waste) of rapeseed cultivation, batteries for shorter distances, hybrid technologies (batteries/diesel) or hydrogen... All these have gone beyond the stage of mere ideas, and are already being used by trains in test mode. We're analyzing the performance of each one, with a view to deploying them and improving them if the tests are conclusive. Story to follow (at very high speed!).

Because we'd love to change it all at the snap of a finger: but it's actually much more complex (and time-consuming) than that. But we're working on it: and we explain in our CSR & Transitions 2023 Report.

In a nutshell. It takes time to change our energies: our advantage is that we started many years ago, and we're ready, if not the first, to offer even more carbon-free trains that say "no thanks" to diesel.