Russian Railways exec says passenger wagons almost 100% localized

MOSCOW, Jul 6 (PRIME) -- The passenger wagons that state-owned railway monopoly Russian Railways uses are almost 100% localized, Deputy CEO Dmitry Pegov told PRIME on Thursday.

“As of the beginning of 2022, localization of the passenger wagons production amounted to 85–94% depending on the model. Last year, (Russian Railways’ subsidiary for long-distance passenger transportation) Federal Passenger Company and Tver Carriage Works started working on imports substitution in the structure designs of the passenger wagons,” he said.

He said he was talking about electric equipment and air conditioners in the first place, because almost 97% of their component parts were replaced with Russian parts while the remaining share of materials are at the warehouses of suppliers in the country.

Localization of production of the Lastochka high-speed trains stands at about 90%, and Russian Railways expects a double-deck edition of the trains to appear soon after localization has reached 100%. The railway monopoly does not reject the idea of building passenger wagons with seat capsules, he said.

Following the withdrawal of Germany’s Siemens, the former partner in production of the Lastochka trains, from Russia, Russian Railways coped with servicing of the Lastochka and Sapsan trains. Also, the Russian company is unlikely to need all the five remaining Sapsan trains that Siemens failed to deliver because of the Western sanctions, and by the time the sanctions are lifted, Russian Railways should already be capable of building high-speed trains of its own, Pegov said.

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