HS2, Covid-19 and complexity

The news is that the government has given the go-ahead for construction work on Highspeed 2 to start, even though much of the country is still in lockdown.  There are a lot of people quite vociferous that this is not a good time to start, and some arguing that this is a good time to drop the whole HS2 project.

Well there is an argument for HS2 that it will free up more space for rail freight, which is a good thing.  And I'm more of a fan of HS3 (which if it ever happens, will be at such a future date that it will do me personally no good).  But those are discussions for another day.

What I wanted to do is discuss is why one factor in this decision is rather unexpected, and an example of the interconnectedness and complexity of our economy.  Yes, starting work keeps some people in jobs and keeps some money flowing in the economy and it is probably better to get some building done for that money rather than pay people 80% to be furloughed.  And yes, it is a big project so might as well get started.  And yes, having started people will be reluctant to stop because of the sunk cost fallacy.  But I'm not thinking of any of those.

Not starting HS2 now might have an impact on the NHS and our fight against Covid-19.  How so?
Well, when we start the construction work we will need concrete - which means that the cement kilns need to be kept going when otherwise they might shut down because of low demand.  And if you know about cement kilns, they are not as quick and easy to shut down and start up as a gas fire.  But we need to look further down the supply chain.  Cement kilns use a lot of fuel.  Where do they get it from?  They use a variety of sources, but one of them is re-processed chemicals that where originally used in the pharmaceutical industry as solvents.  These can be reprocessed to some extent but they can also be blended up as fuel for cement kilns.  What do we do with them if they aren't sent there?  There are only 3 choices - storage, incineration, and shutting the pharmaceutical production.  Storage capacity is not huge, there isn't enough incineration capacity, and it has to go somewhere if you produce it.  So, you say - build more storage.  Why?  We don't need it when the virus is over.  Burn it - well we'd love to have more incinerators, because we are already at maximum capacity, but do you want one in your backyard?  And building incinerators is quick and easy compared to the process for getting permits.  So, if there is nowhere to dispose of the waste (short term), the option left is to close pharmaceutical production - which is obviously not ideal during a pandemic.

So, starting work on HS2 keeps the kilns fired up using fuel from the pharmaceutical industries, which helps the NHS.  A complex web... isn't it?