Preface. As you can see in Table 1 below, water transport is far more energy efficient than land transport, especially once we’re back to muscle power after fossil fuels are gone.
| Kilojoules of energy used to carry one ton of cargo one kilometer | Transportation mode |
| 50 | Oil tankers and bulk cargo ships |
| 100–150 | Smaller cargo ships |
| 250–600 | Trains |
| 360 | Barge |
| 2000–4000 | Trucks |
| 30,000 | Air freight |
| 55,000 | Helicopter |
Table 1 Energy efficiency of transportation in kilojoules/ton/kilometer. Source: Smil (2013), Ashby (2015).
To prepare for energy descent, more canals should be created now, while we still have cheap plentiful energy. We’ll also need to keep in mind the maintenance and dredging of canals after fossils as well (De Decker 2018).
The National Academy of Science study (159 pages) found that the selection of waterways projects for authorization has a long history of being driven largely by political and local concerns. The approval and funding process is an irrational, byzantine mess.
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NRC. 2015. TRB special report 315: funding and managing the U.S. inland waterways system: what policy makers need to know. National Resource Council Transportation research board, National Academy of Sciences.
Inland waterway system stats:
- The inland waterways system moves 6 to 7 percent of all domestic cargo in terms of total ton-miles, mostly coal, petroleum and petroleum products, food and farm products, chemicals and related products, and crude materials.
- Inland waterways include more than 36,000 miles of commercially navigable channels and roughly 240 working lock sites.
- Barges mostly carry energy: coal, crude petroleum, petroleum products, and natural gas based fertilizers
2013 Commodities carried by USACE at http://www.navigationdatacenter.us/wcsc/pdf/pdrgcm13.pdf
- Tons
- Millions Commodity
- 312.3 Coal
- 418.9 Crude petroleum
- 508.6 Petroleum products
- 39.9 Chemical fertilizer
- 140.6 Chemicals excluding fertilizers
- 53 Lumber, logs, wood chips, pulp
- 163.5 Sand, gravel, shells, clay, salt, and slag
- 85.4 Iron ore, iron, and steel waste and scrap
- 29.5 Non-ferrous ores and scrap
- 45 Primary non-metal products
- 72 Primary metal products
- 270 Food and food products
- 121 Manufactured goods
- 62.3 Unknown and not elsewhere classified products
- 2,275 TOTAL
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