Responsibility for the plant and animal world
Despite the impact on the environment, rail tracks, buildings and areas of DB Group often provide a habitat for protected species. We develop eco-friendly solutions to offset any impact that our work has on the natural world.
Mitigation and compensation measures
We document all data on our compensation obligations in the Web-based nature conservation and compensation information system (FINK) No. 59. This enables us to record the current status of our compensation obligations on an ongoing basis and thus fulfill our reporting obligations to the EBA in accordance with the Federal Nature Conservation Act. In 2024, 932 projects and 6,948 compensation measures (3,256 thereof being for species protection) were newly added to the system, which are to be implemented in the coming years. From 2014 to the end of 2024, we added 10,130 projects – with a total of 67,035 compensation measures – to the system. These include 25,590 measures for species protection. As in the previous year, the number of projects with nature conservation compensation measures increased by about 10%.
In January 2024, the near-natural transformation of the River Elz near Riegel and Köndringen in the major Karlsruhe — Basel construction project was recognized as an “Outstanding Example” by the UN Decade of Ecosystem Restoration. The measure was implemented between 2015 and 2017, and today the revitalized section with a total length of 3.5 km is home to numerous bird and other animal species, including many endangered species.
Bird protection measures
In 2023, a multi-year research project was launched at the German Center for Rail Transport Research to investigate possible camera-based methods for assessing the necessity and success of bird protection measures on overhead wire systems. As part of the project, cameras were installed at two locations in 2024 for the automated recording and analysis of digital image and video recordings for the investigation of various causes of hazards.
We recorded about 3,470 short-circuit events on overhead wires caused by animals in 2024.Of these, about 94% are associated with birds and about 6% involved small mammals. To improve the situation, bird protection measures No. 33 are being carried out on the insulators as part of the full overhead wire inspection. Traction current wires in areas that have a high risk of bird collisions are also being made safe.
IT systems to document protected areas
There may be overlaps between conservation areas.
We use geographic information systems, which store data about rail lines and surrounding land and all digitally available information on protected areas in Germany. This enables us to quickly identify the points of contact between nature and DB Groupʼs tracks and land. There are different restrictions and requirements in each protected area, which are described in protected area ordinances. These are stored in our system and are taken into account in construction work.