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Electrification, Why not tax incentives?

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[quote user="SactoGuy188"] I think we have to consider these following factors in terms of electrifying our railroads:1. The upfront cost could be very frightening, especially we're talking the most extensive railroad electrification program anywhere in the world, putting up and maintaining far more miles of overhead electrical wire than any other country on Earth if we electrify all the major north-south and east-west routes.[/quote]Being in the energy biz, I think there may be an opportunity for a cooperative effort between the railroads and utilities.  We do need more transmission lines, but as you point out the up front costs are extremely high.  Ditto for new generation plants.  If certain transmission lines could be incorporated along railroad ROW in conjunction with catenary, then there's the possibility of shared costs to spread the up front risk.  Same with generation plants - the railroads could themselves become merchant electricity providers by building their own plants and selling the excess electricity on the open market.  Even schedule trains to avoid peak electricity demand periods, during which the power could be sold for a premium, then run the trains when demand is lower.[quote]2. We have to design the overhead wiring to it clears the height of two 53' domestic containers plus well car to hold them. That may require very expensive additional lowering of railroad tunnels across the Appalacians and the mountains west of the Mississippi.[/quote]Why not use third rail in tunnels?[quote]3. There may not really be a need to electrify our transcon lines. Thanks to developments in extracting [i]biodiesel[/i] fuel from oil-laden algae (which is far more cost effective than biodiesel from regular plant sources), we could grow algae in large-scale tanks to make enough biodiesel fuel to substantially cut the amount of crude oil needed to make regular diesel fuel. [/quote]I'd like to read up on that algaediesel (?) a little more before I get to excited about it.  It is already proven that synthetic diesel derived from plentiful coal is far cheaper to produce and less risky to invest in than biodiesel from seed crops, with or without the subsidies.  Not only that, but synthetic diesel is actually cleaner than biodiesel!
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