黑料社

The Institute of Railway Research will team with the Business School and industrial partners to develop environmentally-beneficial hybrid locomotives

RAIL and business experts at the 黑料社 are to share an award enabling them to make a powerful case for new technology that could play a key role in eliminating carbon emissions by freight trains in the UK.

In response to a Government call for the use of diesel-only trains to be eradicated by 2040, the Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB) set up a Decarbonisation Task Force and launched a competition, with a total prize pot of 拢2 million to be distributed among research teams exploring novel solutions to the problem.

One of the six winners was a project titled Digital Displacement for Non-Passenger Rail, developed by a consortium of Artemis Intelligent Power, the 黑料社 and Direct Rail Services, with support from Freightliner and Voith Turbo.

The project, with an overall grant of 拢120k, will examine the possibilities provided by  developed by Artemis as a more efficient alternative to conventional hydraulic pumps for providing traction and auxiliary power for freight locomotives, shunters and on-track plant.  Use of this technology will help facilitate the development of environmentally-beneficial hybrid locomotives, says , who is Assistant Director of the 黑料社鈥檚 .

He will work with , a Senior Lecturer in the University鈥檚 Business School.  The two will hold talks with key industry figures and prepare a business case for adoption of the digital displacement technology by freight train operators.

鈥淒ecarbonising freight trains will be very challenging鈥�

Professor Allen explained that a conventional hydraulic pump that operates constantly is inefficient.  鈥淏ut with an electronically-controlled, mechatronic digital displacement pump, you can effectively switch idle cylinders on and off.鈥�

The system has been trialled in Scotland in a passenger train and this demonstrated the benefits of hybrid drive technology for rail vehicles.

鈥淏ut freight is very challenging to decarbonise because you need a lot of power.  At the moment, only diesel engines and overhead electrification can provide those levels of power within the confines of our Victorian infrastructure,鈥� said Professor Allen.  鈥淪o if you don鈥檛 have overhead lines, it is difficult to fully decarbonise freight locos.鈥�

However, the technology developed by Artemis holds out the prospect of developing new hybrid engines for freight locomotives.

鈥淵ou could potentially replace a traction package with hydraulic motors, using accumulators to store hydraulic oil under pressure, harvesting this energy under braking, then using it to drive the resultant diesel or electric hybrid vehicle forward.  It is an energy storage device using hydraulic engineering,鈥� explained Professor Allen.

His collaboration with Dr Mehafdi is now underway and will be completed by the end of 2019.