Finally: A Hybrid Bigger Than a Hummer

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Union Pacific Orders 10 "Green Goat" Hybrid Locomotives for Southern California Rail Yard Operations

[Greeby]

1. From someone who has worked on a railway (albeit steam)

Someone shoot the guy who decided America would call it "switching".

It's SHUNTING, Godammit.

Just needed to vent on that one

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. Hey, we won that war.

We'll call it "switching" if we want.

[happyslug]

3. Here is the Manufacturer's Web Site on the "Green Goat:

http://www.railpower.com/

First let me make it clear ALL diesel locomotives are "Hybrids" in that the diesel engine generate electric power and the electric power is used to power the electric motors on the locomotive's wheels.

The Green Goat just takes this process one step further in that a battery pack is added so that the diesel engine does not have to be on ALL THE TIME (Which is what happens in conventional Diesel Engines). Thus you do not need to Idle the Green Goat (i.e. keep the engine on even if it is standing still waiting to be used). This lack of the need to idle i.e. that the diesel engine can be OFF and the switcher can still operate, is what is producing both the pollution reduction and fuel savings.

I do not see this technology going much further in this field, switchers are notorious for operating at low speeds but at full capacity and than for brief period of time (and idling for hours at a time). Locomotives actually used to pull a train tend to operate above their idle speed for most of their trip and this the savings just are NOT there.

[dcfirefighter]

4. The advantage of hybrid vehicles

is higher peak acceleration for a given engine size...using a smaller engine while retaining acceptible acceleration generally produces better gas mileage.

You'll not most hybrids get better mileage in teh city mode than the highway mode...the hybrid only comes into play during acceleration and deceleration.

A hybrid locomotive wouldn't gain much over a standard one, in most uses.

The real gains necessary for rail to be competitive with trucking include:
reducing train and car weight - trucks have had every nonessential pound removed over the last 30 years, trains have been pretty much the same for the last century.
improved logistics - some railways are good at this, others will lose your shipment for weeks at a time.
improved door-to-door service - a truck can take a shipment from the suppliers shipping dock directly to the customer's receiving dock anywhere in the country. Only a select few heavy industries are located on railways.

I'm pretty sure the bulk of the rail freight industry hauls one of two things: coal and scrap metal. On the east coast there's also the daily tropicana train. I would guess that the first two account for more than half of rail freight tonnage.

[Strelnikov_]

5. "For Rail To Be Competitive With Trucking" We Need To Get The Govt

to stop subsidizing the trucking industry. Make the trucks pay for the relative amount of wear they inflict on the transportation infrastructure.

Also, here in central Iowa, right next to the UP E-W mainline, I would say that freight percentages are:

- 40% Shipping Container cars (imports from Asia)
- 35% Coal
- 15% Grain
- 10% Everything else

Lately, seems like the coal is running higher than containers. Also have noticed over the last month or more, not as may trains. Could be due to the coal chute track problems out in NE/WY.