Quote:
Originally Posted by Big Dave
The only things preventing a comeback are the high capital cost ($10 million a mile) and doubt as to where you'd get all that electricity.
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That capital cost seems high: $10 million/mile for hanging catenary cables?
One way to beat that would be using high-speed flywheels for energy storage in locomotives. From what I've read, they can store enough energy to accelerate a train from stop to running speed. So you'd have to install the catenaries only on parts of your rails - say near stations and on the uphill sides of the "ruling grades". (Same thing would work for city bus lines: a bit of overhead line at the stops charges the flywheel and gets the bus moving, then it cruises to the next stop on stored power...)
As ot where the power comes from, IIRC I once worked out that the diesel used by US railroads is the energy equivalent of 10-20 1 GWatt nuclear plants. (And that's neglecting savings from regen, or the inherently greater efficiency of electric motors.) So sourcing the electricity does not seem to be a major problem.