SunTrain could decarbonise America
A Californian start-up company has found a novel way to bring renewable energy to consumers by using existing infrastructure. The whole concept depends on exploiting the versatility of…
Battery train record breaker caught on camera
It may not have been a top-secret run, but a battery-powered train has quietly smashed the record for unassisted distance in the UK. Caught on camera in the…
British pioneers spark new battery-powered life into centurion shunter
Don’t try to tell Positive Traction that there is no future in the most humble of locomotives still at work today. Quite the opposite. The British technological achievers…
Norway’s Norland Line to be partially electrified for battery locomotives
The iconic Norland railway line crossing Norway on a north-south axis and connecting Trondheim with Bodø will be the first critical route of the country to be upgraded…
Stadler builds new maintenance facility for battery trains in Germany
Swiss train manufacturer Stadler is constructing a new maintenance facility for battery trains in Rendsburg, Germany. The workshop will support the maintenance of the FLIRT Akku battery-electric regional…
A closer look at Italy’s new hydrogen and battery train tenders
Italy is making a leap forward in the use of hydrogen and battery trains, driven by investments via the country’s recovery plan after the corona pandemic. Here is…
Retrofitted hydrogen CAF train starts test runs
Spanish rolling stock manufacturer CAF has started dynamic track testing of their retrofitted Renfe Civia hydrogen-battery train for the FCH2Rail project last week. The European project Fuel Cell…
Siemens joins forces with Mitsubishi for more efficiently powered trains
Siemens Mobility and Mitsubishi Electric Europe will cooperate in the field of power module technology based on silicon carbide (SiC). SiC has the potential of higher energy efficiency…
First ‘overhead line islands’ for battery trains to be built in Germany
Instead of electrifying every kilometer of track, Deutsche Bahn (DB) will make overhead line ‘islands’ for battery trains on local railway lines in Schleswig-Holstein. These first routes using…
German VDV presents plan for faster electrification of railway lines
To realise a significant shift of traffic to the railways to achieve the climate protection targets in the transport sector, the German rail network must be further electrified…
Australian ‘Infinity Train’ uses gravity to recharge batteries
A train on batteries that regenerate automatically sounds futuristic, but is exactly what Australian mining company Fortescue and UK-based Williams Advanced Engineering (WAE) are currently developing. The gravitational…
UK companies developed battery-powered rail handling machine
Unipart Rail and McCulloch Group have launched the first prototype of a battery-powered rail handling machine. The TRT-e is a zero emission version of the Trac Rail Transposer,…
UK’s train battery programme criticised
The UK train battery programme is running out of juice, according to the House of Lords. While rail is being urged to decarbonise, the upper house of the…
CRRC to provide Rotterdam with zero-emission locomotives
The first zero-emission, fully electric shunting locomotives for the port of Rotterdam are in the production line. By 2024, the Dutch harbour wants to replace diesel shunting locomotives…
Adif awards contract for back-up batteries
Spanish infrastructure manager Adif has awarded the supply of batteries for Uninterruptible Power Systems (UPS) to Veolia. The contract includes the delivery of batteries as back-up power for…