Andrew Barr, president of Hitachi Europe, says completing the full route from Euston to Manchester is “absolutely vital”. Photo: Eddie Mulholland
Cutting down the troubled HS2 rail project “is not the right decision” and will make it harder for Britain to cut its carbon emissions, a top executive at Japanese manufacturing giant Hitachi has said.
Andrew Barr, president of Hitachi Europe, said the main benefits of the troubled scheme would only be realized if the line extended to London and further to northern cities such as Manchester.
He added that high-speed rail services must provide an attractive and credible alternative to domestic air travel if the UK is to successfully reduce its carbon footprint.
Hitachi has secured a joint £2bn contract with French train manufacturer Alstom to build and maintain a fleet of 52 trains that will eventually run on the HS2 network.
They will be partly based on Japanese “trains” Shinkansen bullet trains, which Hitachi is involved in, have a top speed of 225 mph.
Hitachi is also bidding to supply signaling infrastructure.
In an interview with The Telegraph, Mr Barr said: “We have to keep working on it [HS2].
“The south end is a key part of this, but you can only really improve it by continuing to expand the network [north].”
His comments come as Rishi Sunak is mulling plans to scrap the northern section of HS2 between Birmingham and Manchester and complete the line in the West London suburb of Old Oak Common rather than Euston to save money.
2801 HS2 Shambles
This could cause problems, Mr. Barr warns, because Old Oak Common “isn't built to handle the number of people you're going to have.”
The proposals presented to Downing Street are not denied and face opposition from senior Tories as well as big business. The government insists no decisions have been made.
HS2 was originally approved as a Y-shaped route from London to Birmingham and then to Manchester and Leeds, at a cost of around £30 billion.
But the cost has since officially risen to £45 billion for the London-Birmingham section alone.
The Prime Minister is reported to be alarmed by Whitehall estimates that the entire scheme could now pass the £100 billion mark.
Speaking at Hitachi's European headquarters in Slough this week, Mr Barr highlighted the benefits of high-speed rail on the continent, where it is much more widespread.
The executive who previously ran the railway division of Hitachi, said HS2 would also provide a much-needed increase in rail capacity, including commercial freight services.
“HS2 is not only about getting people from London to Birmingham faster, but also about increasing capacity – particularly on the West Coast Main Line, which is a major corridor for container shipping,” he said.
“Moving some of the passenger traffic creates additional capacity for [container traffic] and commuting.”
Completing the full route from Euston to Manchester was “absolutely vital to making this happen”. “, he added.
At the same time, he argued that HS2 should be just the beginning of a national high-speed network extending to Scotland, allowing Britons to give up flying.
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The Independent Committee on Climate Change said increasing domestic train travel is key to ensuring aviation emissions reach net zero by 2050.
“I would like to see a situation where it actually replaces domestic air travel,” Mr. Barr said. “It's the right thing from a sustainability point of view and I think it's the right thing to do.
“If you look at Italy, which is a classic case, they've invested heavily in high-speed rail and now it's very a reliable alternative to air.”
He added that digitalisation, electrification and soon batteries will revolutionize the way railways are run, making them more efficient, easier to maintain and cheaper to expand without expensive infrastructure.
For example, Hitachi is testing intercity trains in Italy that can switch between using overhead wires and batteries for power, eliminating the need to rely on a diesel engine.
Meanwhile, Britain's Great Western Main Line is testing sensors installed on trains that can detect track problems by monitoring tiny bumps absorbed by the suspension.
This could allow engineers to make repairs before major problems arise, while potentially eliminating Network Rail's need to frequently run trains to monitor yellow tracks.
Greater digitalisation of signaling and other train infrastructure will eventually enable a small number of rail operator staff to control entire networks remotely from a single control room. “This is something of a game changer,” Mr. Barr added.
Developing software capable of managing these types of complex systems, as well as the hardware they run on, is a growing business for Hitachi, the once sprawling conglomerate that has scaled back its offerings after posting the Japanese manufacturer's biggest-ever loss. (787.3 billion yen, about 6.55 billion pounds sterling at the time) during the financial crisis.
The company is now focusing on green energy and mobility, digital services and industrial equipment. In 2022, sales were 10.9 trillion yen (£60 billion) and profits were around 671 billion yen (£4 billion).
Although Mr. Barr originally worked in the rail transport industry, he now represents all Hitachi businesses in Europe. Energy could be a significant boon as the continent tries to transition to renewables and move away from Russian gas.
0206 Power generation in Europe
Hitachi specializes in huge transformers and high-voltage cables.
It built the North Sea Link between the UK and Norway, and its future projects include a link between mainland Scotland and Shetland, as well as undersea cables that will carry power onshore from the Dogger Bank wind farm off the Yorkshire coast.
Hitachi was also once among the firms pushing for a revival of UK nuclear energy, with plans for projects in Wylfa, on Anglesey, north Wales, and Oldbury, South Gloucestershire, but abandoned its proposals several years ago after was unable to secure government funding.
Asked whether Hitachi would again consider large-scale nuclear power in the UK, Mr Barr said: “Unlikely. However, we still own these two sites and I believe we need to make them available to the industry for best use.”
However, the company is a minority shareholder in a nuclear joint venture with General Electric that has developed a small modular reactor project and is among those expected to take part in the state competition for funding.
Hitachi is also a minority shareholder. testing the use of green hydrogen in backup generators that can be used by data centers, many of which are now switching to diesel.
Perhaps the biggest untapped potential, however, Mr Barr says, is to digitize more services in both energy and transport.
In Italy, Hitachi is testing Bluetooth technology that will allow customers to automatically pay for bus and train tickets using their phones by simply logging onto public transport, rather than having to buy physical receipts or connect with plastic cards. .
“My concern is buying a train ticket when you go to the station,” Mr. Barr said. “You stand in line at the machine to get a piece of the card that confirms you paid the money. This is madness.
“Everyone has a smartphone in their pocket that can do this. So why not?
If they ever manage to build it, perhaps HS2 management will accept the offer.
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