Live Coverage: 'Driving Innovation in Railway Infrastructure Through Materials' ERCI Webinar

RAILTARGET brings you live coverage from today’s ERCI Webinar on “Driving Innovation in Railway Infrastructure Through Materials.” The session focuses on how innovative material strategies, circular economy principles, and digital tools can reduce waste and improve sustainability across railway infrastructure projects.

10:00 Lutz Hübner opens the webinar by introducing the session’s focus on sustainable material strategies for railway infrastructure. The discussion will explore how reuse, recycling, and improved material management can help reduce the environmental footprint of railway construction projects while improving efficiency across the sector.

10:10 Els Vermeire, Expert at TUC RAIL, presents the EcoTrack platform, an internally developed application created to support circular economy principles across railway infrastructure projects. She explains that the idea came up after repeated observations that large quantities of unused materials remained on construction sites at project closure, often disappearing without visibility or reuse possibilities.

Initially managed through simple Excel inventories, the process later evolved into EcoTrack, a dedicated in-house application designed to create a structured inventory of available railway materials and make them visible across all projects within the organisation.

10:15 Vermeire explains that EcoTrack functions as a digital inventory for both unused new materials and reusable dismantled materials coming from railway works. The platform includes components such as rails, sleepers, signalling equipment, cables, hydraulic systems, and concrete elements, as well as reusable ballast and track materials recovered from dismantling operations.

The objective is to allow engineers and project managers to identify available materials already during the design phase of projects, reducing the need to purchase new components and helping avoid unnecessary waste during construction works.

10:20 Demonstrating the platform live, Vermeire shows how users can search, reserve, edit, and transfer materials directly within the application. The system includes GPS localisation, project assignment, automated notifications, reservation workflows, and transport booking functionalities.

According to Vermeire, one of the key advantages is operational visibility: site leaders and engineers can immediately see what materials are available across all construction sites and contact colleagues directly if urgent components are needed for ongoing works.

10:25 The EcoTrack platform also integrates financial and logistics workflows. Materials supplied by infrastructure manager Infrabel can be transferred between projects with automated internal booking procedures, ensuring costs are correctly reassigned while unused materials remain visible within the organisation instead of being discarded.

Vermeire notes that materials remaining unused for extended periods can eventually be returned into central inventory management through dedicated workflows designed to prevent the platform from becoming overloaded with obsolete stock.

10:30 Concluding the presentation, Vermeire says that digital tools alone are not enough to create a circular economy in railway infrastructure. According to her, success depends on changing daily working practices and encouraging employees to actively use reuse platforms in real project environments.

She describes circular economy as "a team project," arguing that sustainable infrastructure management requires cooperation between engineers, construction managers, logistics teams, and contractors in order to reduce waste and maximise reuse across railway projects.

10:35 Steve Barbour, Managing Director of Composite Braiding at Rail Forum, presents the Composite Twin Track Cantilever Structure (CTTC), a project focused on replacing traditional galvanised steel railway infrastructure with lightweight thermoplastic composite structures.

Barbour introduces his UK-based SME as a specialist in structural composite manufacturing, particularly in braided thermoplastic composites designed for high-volume, lower-cost, and more sustainable production. He notes that the CTTC project recently received the ERCI SME Innovation Award as well as several national and international composite industry awards.

Explaining the technology behind the project, Barbour describes composite braiding as a highly automated weaving process used to create strong hollow structural components such as poles, beams, and tubes. According to him, the process allows the company to manufacture lightweight structures with very low production waste (currently below 2%), with most scrap material reusable.

He also outlines the basics of fibre-reinforced polymer composites, including glass fibre and thermoplastic materials, stressing that thermoplastic composites are particularly attractive because they can be reheated, repaired, and recycled at the end of their life cycle.

10:40 Sustainability becomes one of the central themes of the presentation. Barbour explains that the company developed new consolidation methods allowing large composite structures to be produced dramatically faster and with far lower energy consumption compared to traditional autoclave manufacturing.

As an example, he says a process that previously required two and a half hours and 70 kWh of energy can now be completed in under five minutes using around 1.5 kWh, which represents energy savings of up to 98%.

10:45 Barbour then presents the CTTC structure itself, designed as a lightweight alternative to traditional steel overhead line equipment. The composite structure reduced total weight from approximately 1,700 kilograms for the steel version to just 277 kilograms, while still meeting required mechanical and operational standards.

The use of thermoplastic composites also makes the structure non-conductive, an important advantage in high-voltage railway environments. In addition, the material can be remelted and reused for repair or recycling at the end of service life.

10:50 A major advantage is installation efficiency. Because of the significant weight reduction, the structures require less heavy equipment, fewer workers, reduced transport needs, and potentially less concrete infrastructure.

Barbour states that an eight-metre vertical mast could be installed in around three minutes, with the project estimating at least a doubling of installation productivity while also reducing time spent working on ballast and near operational tracks.

10:55 Concluding the session, Barbour argues that composite railway infrastructure could become a "game changer" for the sector by combining comparable costs to galvanised steel with lower installation costs, reduced carbon footprint, improved worker safety, and easier maintenance.

He also stresses that the technology is not limited to overhead line structures alone. The same composite manufacturing approach is already being explored for tram crash structures and other railway infrastructure applications, while the company continues expanding into additional transport and industrial sectors.

11:00 The webinar continues with a Q&A session focused on the long-term durability and practical applications of composite railway infrastructure materials.

One of the first questions addresses how thermoplastic composite structures perform over time compared to traditional steel infrastructure and whether their service life can realistically match steel equivalents used in rail environments.

11:05 Steve Barbour explains that composite structures must follow the principle of using the "right material in the right place." In the CTTC project, for example, steel was still used for specific structural sections where it performed better under particular loading conditions, while most of the structure used thermoplastic composites.

According to Barbour, composite materials can match steel mechanically, while also offering major advantages in areas such as corrosion resistance. He notes that carbon fibre itself can achieve tensile properties several times stronger than steel, although proper engineering and material selection remain essential.

11:10 Addressing durability concerns, Barbour says the expected service life of the composite structures should at least match that of steel infrastructure. He also points to existing bridge projects in the UK designed with service lives of up to 120 years using composite technologies.

Questions also focus on how the materials behave in harsh environmental conditions, including marine and high-salinity environments. Barbour explains that composite materials do not suffer from corrosion in the same way as steel, although UV degradation and other environmental factors must still be considered during material selection and design.

11:15 The discussion focuses potential future applications beyond overhead line structures. Barbour suggests that composite materials could be used for signal posts, handrails, structural supports, and even rolling stock components where significant weight reduction is beneficial.

He specifically mentions rooftop HVAC support structures on rail vehicles as one possible application, arguing that composite alternatives could reduce component weight by up to 70–80% while maintaining the required mechanical performance. According to Barbour, the key challenge is identifying operational problems where lightweight, corrosion-resistant composite structures can deliver practical value.