MT Magazine July/August 2023

FEATURE STORY

THE TRANSPORTATION ISSUE

20

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As efficient as these giant hybrid vehicles are, there is still that fuel: diesel. The combustion of diesel fuel results in particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxides, and other pollutants. So railroad companies and locomotive manufacturers are looking at alternatives in order to reduce their carbon footprints.

diesel-electric locomotives used GE motors. Today, Wabtec has a global installed base of locomotives of about 23,000 units. Wabtec is taking a portfolio approach to reducing emissions in the locomotives it produces, such as using liquified natural gas and performing research on various biofuels. Importantly, Wabtec has developed FLXdrive, a fully battery electric locomotive. No diesel. Just electricity. In a three-month pilot – revenue service, so this wasn’t an engineering trial – conducted with BNSF Railway in San Joaquin Valley, California, they found the locomotive, which has 2.4 megawatt hours of lithium-ion battery storage, saved what would have been more than 6,200 gallons of diesel fuel and prevented 69 tons of carbon dioxide emissions from being produced during the 13,320-plus miles of freight hauling. This performance was an industry first. Presently FLXdrive locomotives are in production at the company’s complex in Erie, Pennsylvania. One will be delivered this year to Australian mining company Roy Hill. It has an energy capacity of more than twice that of the pilot locomotive: 7 MWh. Roy Hill will be using it in an iron ore hauling operation – trains that are on the order of 1.6 miles long.

The Wabtech Portfolio Approach One company with a strong position in this space is Pittsburgh based Wabtec Corp., a leading manufacturer of locomotives. It has been in the train business for more than 150 years. It originally began in 1869 as Westinghouse Air Brake Co. and since then has grown both organically and through acquisition. The latter included the 2019 merger with GE Transportation, which had been around since 1907 and produced its first locomotive in 1912. Interestingly, those early Electro-Motive

The BrightDrop Zevo 600: GM went from concept to product in just 20 months, a record for the company. ( Image: BrightDrop )