Green train technology needed to keep air clean
Railway operator BNSF Railway Co. is considering building a new railway hub at the Southern California Logistics Airport, which is projected to remove hundreds of trucks off the road thanks to rail's massive freight capabilities. The rail hub would process approximately 50,000 freights cars in the first year. Whether air quality will increase or not in the High Desert with the opening though has turned out to be a topic of hot debate.
Trains and heavy trucks both run on diesel, and a single locomotive can pull the load of about 280 trucks with about 30 times the emissions of one truck. But increased vehicle congestion at railroad crossings and the fact that trains usually spend a lot of time idling could turn out to reduce the possible air pollution benefits of increased use of rail freight. No doubt both trucks and trains will be needed in greater numbers with the goods movement industry expecting to triple the amount of cargo coming into California ports by 2025.
Any use of newer, cleaner technologies in locomotives such as electric, natural gas and hybrid diesel is likely to take a long time to become integrated into rolling stock across the U.S. with only about one new locomotive being built a week.
Analysis: BNSF has 6,300 locomotives. If they were to replace one locomotive per week with a new, cleaner model using say diesel-electric hybrid technology coupled with particulate filters and the like, it would take BNSF 121 years to completely retire their current locomotives. This is a problem.
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[Source: Victoriaville Daily Press]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Phil L. 12:13PM (1/29/2007)
Can anyone back up the "one locomotive a week" statistic?
If true, there are significant challenges ahead in the rail industry, even independent of green issues.
I'm sure that neither BNSF nor any other rail carrier expect their locomotives to last 121 years. Even though locomotives are designed to be overhauled and repowered several times during their useful lifetimes (unlike automobiles), they will still need to be replaced at some point. That statistic implies that the current US locomotive production capacity will not meet future needs. Are imports a big factor in the rail industry?
The upside of long-term design: It's possible for existing locomotives to reap the benefits of updated drivetrain technology, though not without significant cost.
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Greg Alton 1:26PM (1/29/2007)
My understanding is that virtually all locomotives (except electric) in USA/Canada are diesel-electric hybrids. Main issue is not likely to be use of newer technology, but better fuel and emissions controls.
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mulad 1:20PM (1/29/2007)
There's no way that there's only one locomotive being built each week. The engine in the photo for this post looks like a GE Evolution Series, and there are tons of those on the rails already (I'm not sure when they were introduced, but it was only a few years ago). Wikipedia indicates that there were nearly 2000 built or on order as of last summer, so I suspect it's closer to one a day than one a week.
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Phil L. 2:20PM (1/29/2007)
Greg -
Diesel-electric locomotives generally aren't "hybrid" in the current automotive sense of the word.
The electric motors in a typical locomotive merely perform the function of a transmission in a car. The diesel engine drives a generator - but (in general) the motors can't also be driven by batteries, and regenerative braking isn't available. Think about it: The battery size and capacity requirements would be astronomical.
A moving train has lots of potential energy, but only the driven locomotive wheels would have the potential for regenerative capabilities, while each car in the train has brakes. In fact, many locomotives use the locomotive wheel motors as generators during braking - but merely send the power to resistor banks; waste heat.
Typical automotive hybrids count on frequent stops and starts to take advantage of regenerative braking (this is why many hybrids get better city mileage than highway). Most locomotive use is steady-state (long runs at constant speed), so automotive hybrid approaches don't offer significant advantages.
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Gale Whitaker 1:00PM (2/01/2007)
The bloggers at (google) "Hubbert's Peak say (convincingly) that the price of fuel is going to triple in the near future. With the price of fuel sky rocketing it will pay the railroad companies to replace their old engines with new ones that are more fuel effecient.
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