These wagon keepers teamed up to be in the running for 1.17 million euros
Fifteen European wagon keepers will unite in a consortium in order to be eligible for 1.17 million euros in EU funding. The funding is needed to make the wagons silent, a costly upgrade. The consortium is called VERS, and it will go live on Monday 19 September.
It is the second time the VPI service company VERS acts as consortium leader to make it easier for wagon keepers to access EU funding for noise abatement in their fleets. Forming a consortium is particularly necessary for smaller wagon keepers, as it is only possible to apply for funds from the “Connecting Europe Facility (CEF)” program for 2,000 wagons or more. Together, the consortium participants contribute 3,500 wagons.
Noise reduction measures
On 19 September the fifteen companies will confirm their participation in the VERS consortium with their signatures. Most of them are wagon keepers from Eastern Europe, but the list also includes German companies as Transwaggon and VTG Rail Europe.
The participating companies plan to make future-oriented investments in their fleets. Noise reduction is one of the aims, which has been high on the agenda of railways in Europe.
In order to reduce noise, wagon keepers can replace iron cast brakes with composite brake blocks. These roughen the wheels much less than the conventional brakes.
CEF programme
The CEF programme runs until the end of 2026. In the previous CEF programme, VERS successfully raised funds under a consortium too. To date, more than 2.5 million euros have been distributed to eight of the participating companies.
The full list of companies under the new consortium is:
- Cargo Wagon, a.s., SK
- Danucem Wien GmbH, AT
- GATX Rail Austria GmbH, AT
- INA – Industrija nafte d.d., Croatia (CRO)
- MOL Magyar Olaj- és Gázipari Nyrt., HU
- NH-TRANS SE, CZ
- PETROLSPED Kft., HU
- Pultrans Kft., HU
- sbs wagon s.r.o., CZ
- sbs wagon rail s.r.o., CZ
- SBS Cargo Praha s.r.o., CZ
- SLOVNAFT, a.s., SK
- TransPlus (Slovensko) s.r.o., SK
- TRANSWAGGON GmbH, DE
- VTG RAIL EUROPE GmbH, DE
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