A Spanish steel company with a production facility in Wales, supported by a British Rail freight company, running Italian locomotives. It’s like Brexit never happened. Nevertheless, the rail services provided by GB Railfreight keep manufacturing moving at the Celsa steelworks in Cardiff. Now, just like their hi-tech furnaces, rail operations are modernising too.
Rolling stock leasing company Porterbrook has procured three top-of-the-range locotractors from Zephir, the specialist manufacturers of multi-fuelled, multi-modal shunters. The versatile power units have been leased to GB Railfreight. GBRf has been handling rail movements at the Welsh steelworks for nearly fifteen years. The brand new motive power will supplant ageing traditional diesel shunters, familiar to generations. Move over Class 08, you’re about to be terminated.
Less Arnold, more Summer
They go on rails. They have tyres. They get up on drive away on the roads. Like a benign little terminator, they absolutely will not stop. Fortunately, the Zephir LOK 16.300 most certainly can be reasoned with – thanks to remote control options. As a replacement for the Class 08, they cut a futuristic dash that looks more like Summer Glau than Arnold Schwarzenegger. There’s a spooky synergy in their deployment in the white-hot environment of a futuristic electric-arc furnace steelworks. The powerful little LOK 16.300 is, however, the last thing to end up melted down like a T-1000.
Amid all the angst over the proposals for another steelworks in Wales to convert to electric arc furnaces, it may come as a revelation to discover that Celsa Steel is already juicing up production with a prodigious application of electric current. GBRf also bring in supplies of scrap steel, giving rise to the anomaly that their diesel operations could be considered less green than steel production. Well, not quite a position agreed by GBRf.
Huge shunter fleet up for renewal
GBRf’s fleet of modified 08s are from a design that’s almost 100 years old. The LOK 16.300 is somewhat more sprightly. The Italian manufacturers say it’s a more sustainable option than traditional depot shunters, with an expected fuel efficiency saving of up to 60 per cent. They provide depot operational flexibility as they are capable of operating outside of railway infrastructure. The units have been procured through Zephir’s UK distributor Depot Rail, who will also support the shunters while they are in active operations.
There are over 300 depot shunters currently operating in the UK, and most are due for renewal over the next five years, according to Porterbrook’s Head of Freight and Route Services, Mark Wyborn. “Bringing these lower-emission Zephirs under our ownership for GB Railfreight marks a further diversification of our freight fleet”, he said. “[That] underlines our dedication to supporting the sector with affordable, innovative and sustainable rolling stock.”
Zephir was founded as an Italian company out of Modena, which is also known as a manufacturing centre for road vehicles, commonly known as Ferrari. The company is now part of a worldwide organisation under the umbrella of Berkshire Hathaway. The vast American holding company is based in Omaha, Nebraska where, when last we checked, no Ferraris are manufactured. For hi-tech shunters through, we’ll be back.