Four reasons why water transportation is less expensive than land transportation:
1.The cost of waterway construction varies greatly.
Water transport is based on the ocean, rivers and lakes, and is a natural heavy-duty channel, so there is no need to invest in the construction of roads, only need to build wharves to be navigable around the world.
For example, if China builds a terminal in Shanghai, it can transport goods to global ports such as New York, San Francisco, Sydney, Rotterdam, Singapore, Busan, Dubai, London, Hamburg, and Kobe, as well as inland ports such as Wuhan and Chongqing along the river, with very low construction costs.
Ningbo-Zhoushan Port, which has the world's largest throughput, has a construction cost of only 7.8 billion yuan.
Spend 7.8 billion yuan to build a cargo terminal, which can be completed in one year12With a cargo throughput of 500 million tons and 30 million TEUs, the voyage range is tens of thousands of kilometers, such as to Europe and the United States, and the voyage range is generally more than 10,000 kilometers.
If Zhoushan Port is only used for 50 years, the average terminal cost per ton-kilometer = 7.8 billion 12500 million 10000 50 = 000001248 yuan, almost negligible.
As for the construction of railways, the heavy-haul railway with the strongest transportation capacity in the world is China Haoji Railway, which can be transported 1 in a single trip20,000 tons, the freight volume in 2022 will reach 90 million tons, the transportation distance will be 1,815 kilometers, and the construction cost of the Haoji Railway will be more than 200 billion yuan.
If the Haoji Railway is also used for 50 years, then, the cost of the Haoji Railway per ton-kilometer = 200 billion 0900 million 1815 50 = 00245 yuan.
The cost of railway tonne-kilometres was about 1960 times that of the terminal.
2.The cost of transportation.
The cost of a 300,000-ton bulk carrier is about 200 million RMB; If you use heavy-haul trains, one wagon can transport 35 tons of coal, if each train has 200 wagons, each train can transport 7,000 tons, and 300,000 tons need 43 trains.
In 2013, CSR received orders for 244 heavy-duty locomotives from China Railway, with a total price of 7.2 billion yuan, each locomotive is about 30 million yuan, and 43 trains need 12900 million yuan, 6 times the cost of a freighter.
The above is not counting the ** of the train wagon.
The cost of one wagon is at least one million yuan, the total cost of 200 wagons will exceed 200 million yuan, and 43 train wagons will require 8 billion yuan.
With the same capacity, the cost of a heavy-haul train is about 40 times that of a ship.
3.Fuel costs.
Because water transportation has to overcome the friction of water, water is a natural lubricant, and the resistance is very small;
Train transportation has to overcome the friction of solids, which is far greater than the resistance of water.
As a result, the energy costs of train transport are much higher than those of water transport.
4.Labor costs.
A 300,000-ton cargo ship only needs a dozen crew members to complete long-distance transportation of tens of thousands of kilometers;
To achieve the same train traffic, 43 trains are needed, and each train must be equipped with 2 drivers + 2 safety officers, which is almost 172 staff.
In order to maintain the safety of train transportation, regular safety inspections and patrols have to be done along the line, which also requires a lot of people.
With the same capacity, the labor cost of train transportation is at least 10 times that of a ship.
In addition to the above four points, there are also environmental impacts.
Water transport does not need to be closed transportation, mainly gliding on the water surface, and has little impact on the ecological environment.
The heavy-haul railway requires the construction of a railway, which is closed along the way, cutting the line into two physical units, forcing most wild animals to change their migration routes, which has a very large impact on the ecological environment and the indirect costs are difficult to estimate.
If it is replaced by a truck, the cost is even higher, and the cost of road construction, vehicles, personnel, and fuel are several times higher than that of trains. Hotspot Engine Program