The Austrian Federal Railways want to heat their vehicles to a maximum of 2022 degrees Celsius in the imminent winter of 23/19. This applies regardless of whether the train is powered by diesel or electricity. It should also be cooler in the offices, workshops and train stations in the future.

With this measure, ÖBB wants to reduce electricity consumption. This is how energy saving calls from the government and the European Union are met. Politicians want less electricity and gas to be consumed, fearing that gas could run out as a result of EU sanctions against Russia. Minister of Transport Leonore Gewessler (Greens) also wants to ban so-called heating pads because she believes that natural gas can be saved as a result. However, the devices she criticizes are powered by propane-butane gas, which is not methane gas. The savings cannot therefore be “fed into the grid”.

The situation is similar when lowering the temperature in vehicles that are powered by diesel. The fuel saving is minimal. ÖBB also wants its subsidiary Österreichische Postbus AG to heat the vehicles to a maximum of 19 degrees. The bottom line is that you want to achieve group-wide savings "in the low single-digit percentage range". Expressed in figures: the aim is to use 250.000 kilowatt hours less electricity per year. How much this amount is in diesel, you don't know yourself. As a reminder: significant parts of the ÖBB network and the vast majority of Postbuses run on diesel.

Only 18 degrees at Wiener Linien

Wiener Linien want to go one step or one degree further. With the exception of the diesel buses, all vehicles are powered by electricity. In the winter of 2022/23, these will be heated to a maximum of 18 degrees Celsius, so that public transport in the federal capital will be one degree Celsius cooler than ÖBB. In the case of the older high-floor trams, however, precise regulation is likely to be difficult because, due to their age, they do not have a state-of-the-art ventilation system that can be precisely adjusted. Here it will probably depend heavily on the individual temperature perception of drivers and technicians.

The largest municipal transport company in Austria also wants to save electrical energy by reducing the lighting. It should be darker on the platforms. They want to largely do without neon signs or the spotlighting of works of art. The conversion of older lights to LED technology is also to be promoted. This affects both the infrastructure and vehicles.