During a factory tour, the differences were explained, and shown, of the latest railcars compared to the fleet that was used until recently for the transport of acrylonitrile. There was much appreciation from the delegation of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management for AnQore's efforts for safer transport of raw materials. The delegation was particularly enthusiastic about the renewed head shields and anti-climbing protection, as well as the innovative application of sensors and the resulting data. This enables AnQore to control the routing of wagons, monitor speeds and report to the government on the use of the Basis Network.
After the tour, a session led by Sjoerd Zuidema, Director Purchasing & Supply Chain, discussed the perception of the transport of chemicals by rail.The participants agreed that more could be done to draw attention to the high level of safety of rail transport. It was also felt that more could be done to share the many and good initiatives in the field of safety and sustainability, such as the initiatives of AnQore.
Subsequently, a link was made to the use of sensors in inland shipping. Where AnQore is experimenting with a sensor on its rail wagons that monitors the temperatures, pressure and filling level in the tanks, there is still little support for this in the shipping industry. This kind of cross-fertilization can help the industry to learn from and strengthen each other in the field of transport safety.
At the end of the visit, the added value of such working visits from government to industry was confirmed by a number of practical matters. A good example was the awareness among the participants that the need for a multilingual driver for transport to Belgium can lead to unnecessary situations. If there is no multilingual driver on a train to or via Belgium, a train will currently have to run over the already very busy Brabant route instead of the much quieter route over Visé. Now that the government has taken note of this, this can easily be solved with a relatively simple adjustment of treaties between 2 countries. And the safety on the track will improve slightly.