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Tesla launches first all-electric 'Giga Train' – and it's free to ride
- 39896880 2y agoElectric trains have been around and widely adopted for more than 100 years. What is novel about these?
- rmason 2y agoElectric powered trains are run by diesel engines to produce the electricity, the Giga train uses batteries like an EV.
- fragmede 2y agoor by a third rail or overhead wire
- IncreasePosts 2y agoBatteries are cool PR, but wouldn't it be better for a train to not have to accelerate all the mass of the batteries, and just use wires overhead to deliver power?
- fragmede 2y ago"just" run high powered wires with enough energy to move an entire train for the entire length of the track? and deal with having a coupling system to the train? obviously since it's been done it's feasible, but I think you're discounting how much work that is to build and maintain. I'm not sure what's more resilient, if a tree falls on to the tracks breaking the electrified wire, it'd also be on the rails, stopping the train anyway, but I imagine not having an electrified wired dangling around across the country is less dangerous than having a battery in a known location with qualified engineers looking after it. They could just be doing this for PR purposes, but I'd love to see the internal cost analysis that was done to build this vs the cost of building using a known good solution.
- qarl 2y agoThe whole point of electric is to improve environmental impact. Wasting energy by moving those batteries is contrary to that goal.
- fragmede 2y agoit's not like running a wire for great lengths is ecologically neutral either though, and power transmission lines have losses too. We'd have to see some actual numbers before deciding if moving heavy batteries is better or worse than having an electrified wire.
- qarl 2y agoI guess I don't see the big issue with running a wire when you already must run a much larger and more complex track. And yes, we'd need to see numbers to be certain, but my intuition tells me that transmission losses won't come close to hauling all that weight.
- csb6 2y ago> “just" run high powered wires with enough energy to move an entire train for the entire length of the track? This has been done successfully around the world since the 1880s. Looking at a map it seems like the length of the line is only a few miles, so doesn’t seem like it would be that huge of an electrification project, especially considering Germany’s rails are already 55% electrified.
- timeon 2y agoHaven't you be to railroad? It is really "just" how it works for centuries.
- mensetmanusman 2y agoDepending on the location, it’s more environmentally impactful to run copper wires everywhere. Batteries have a lot of advantages if you trust they won’t explode too often.
- vel0city 2y agoLots of trains designed to run by overhead lines have some amount of on-board storage capacity in case power goes out on a segment of the path.
- orwin 2y agoI almost bored you with technical details I will refrain, but basically, you want your train to be able to continue if you have a third rail/overhead failure. Look up TGV-M if you want more information.
- adrian_b 2y agoTrains with batteries might make sense in USA, but it is extremely weird to see one in Europe, where electrified rails are ubiquitous and they do not have the disadvantage of batteries that must be charged and which have a limited lifetime.
- sva_ 2y agoI think with the crumbling infrastructure here in Germany, anything that reduces infrastructure maintenance probably makes sense. And ubiquitous? Last time I checked more than half of all trains here ran on Diesel engines. No idea if it improved since, but probably not by much.
- AnimalMuppet 2y agoThat is not what is normally called an electric train. That is called a diesel train. (Or a diesel-electric train.)
- qarl 2y agoUmmm... what charges the batteries? Not diesel?
- stetrain 2y agoThe "Giga train" is an off-the-shelf battery electric train that Siemens already produces. Tesla just funded their use on this shuttle line for employees of their factory.
- timeon 2y agoIs it common for main railroads not to be electrified? In what part of the world do you live?
- vel0city 2y agoLots of routes around the world rely on diesel-electric trains. Its not like its some rare thing.
- vel0city 2y agoI just rode on a train earlier today that was powered mostly by solar, wind, and some natural gas delivered by the grid.
- option 2y ago[flagged]
- blackeyeblitzar 2y agoSince it is battery based, it can work on lines that don’t have overhead wiring, presumably. From the actual article behind the linked one (https://www.teslarati.com/teslas-all-electric-giga-train-in-germany-takes-first-trip/ https://www.teslarati.com/teslas-all-electric-giga-train-in-...), it looks like this is effectively an employee shuttle: > The Giga Train is Tesla’s answer to potential concerns that some employees might have had regarding how they would get to work. The new train will eventually transport 4,500 employees to the factory every single day, where they will build the company’s all-electric vehicles. It is replacing a train that currently runs on diesel: > Niederbarnimer Eisenbahngesellschaft, or NEB, is the train’s operator, and plans to switch to an e-fleet of trains starting at the end of this year. Managing director Sebastian Achtermann said: > “We will put 31 battery-electric multiple units and seven hydrogen multiple units into operation, gradually replacing the diesel fleet we currently use.” But if this is something they want to actually turn into a product instead of purchasing an existing battery based train, I could see Tesla learning from this experiment and then targeting geographies where there are lots of diesel based train lines without electrification.
- lysace 2y agoThe novel aspect is the train being electric without needing a overhead line or a third rail. I guess it could be useful where it's cost-prohibitive to electrify the traditional way, typically in rural areas.
- stetrain 2y agoNot really novel here. Tesla funds this employee shuttle route to their factory and it is now using off-the-shelf Siemens Miero B battery-electric trains. It's a nice service to provide, and nice that the electric car factory is served by an electric train, but Tesla isn't launching any new product or technology here.
- lysace 2y agoThanks, then my comment applies to "Siemens Miero B battery-electric trains".
- rsynnott 2y agoThat’s also not novel. Here’s one from almost a century ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drumm_Battery_Train https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drumm_Battery_Train (it predates diesel locomotives as a common thing; it was primarily competing with steam engines). More recently, these have become somewhat commonly used on partially electrified lines. There are at least three types in use in Germany: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battery_electric_multiple_unit#Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battery_electric_multiple_unit... (the ‘Tesla’ one is the third type listed.)
- perihelions 2y agoIt amazed me when I learned this (from "Railroad Tycoon II"), that widespread, commercial use of electric trains counterintuitively predated the diesel era. Though the brushed electric motors they had pre-WW2 were very primitive and weak compared to today's. They had no electric batteries worth speaking of, but it was all overhead wires, and labor was cheap; rolling out gigantic infrastructure projects was cheap.
- vel0city 2y agoIt always blows people's minds in North Texas when I tell them there was electric train service from Dennison to Waco and Corsicana before automobiles were popular. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Electric_Railway https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Electric_Railway What's really crazy is I've told people this while in the park right outside the museum with one of the electric railroad cars and people still didn't have a clue despite being able to see the old railroad stop and living there a generation.
- walrus01 2y agoThis appears to be a battery powered version of a diesel multiple unit type regional commuter rail train, notice the lack of overhead wiring for a catenary fed train system. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_multiple_unit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_multiple_unit
- stetrain 2y agoNothing novel about this specific bit of news. Tesla funds an employee shuttle rail service to a station at their factory. That service is now using battery-electric trains which are off the shelf models from Siemens. Battery-electric passenger trains as an off-the-shelf option are a relatively new phenomenon, but not brand new or unique to this line or use case.
- ptsneves 2y agoElectricity in Germany is dirty with a lot of coal. I think even diesel is cleaner than coal.
- option 2y agothe right way to solve this problem is to start building nuclear. And to throw to jail previous crop of German politicians who sold out its energy independence to russia and fossil fuel lobby
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- Barrin92 2y ago>who sold out its energy independence man you are going to be angry when you find out where American and European nuclear companies buy their enriched uranium from https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-us-europe-nuclear-exports-4129cbea2aaa69b1da5d09a41804f745 https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-us-europe-nucl...
- option 2y agoyes, i am angry about that too
- card_zero 2y ago> The X-12's unique reactor would be a six-sided, double-walled vessel of stainless steel, only three feet high and wide and one foot thick. Inside it would be 64 gallons of "soup" — uranyl sulfate (a yellowish compound of uranium) dissolved in water. The 20 pounds of uranium in the uranyl sulfate would mostly be of the fissionable U-235 variety. > How would passengers, crew, even people standing on station platforms be protected from the deadly rays generated in the core? Most reactors have tremendous concrete walls surrounding them, but such a shield could not possibly be squeezed onto a locomotive frame. The X-12 shielding would weigh 200 tons, measure 10 by 15 by 15 feet, and be four feet thick. It would consist of several steel tanks nestling one inside another. The steel would stop the X-ray-like gamma radiation. To confine neutrons, the spaces between steel tanks would be filled with hydrogen-rich material like water, paraffin, or plastic. > The big gain from atomic fuel, as Dr. Borst sees it, is likely to be an economic one. Despite the high cost of an engine like the X-12 — around $1,200,000, twice the price of a comparable diesel — its almost negligible fuel requirement (eleven pounds of uranium per year) could make it cheap to operate. This would be particularly true if it could be kept in operation nearly continuously, pulling high-speed expresses over long hauls and wasting little time turning around for the return trip. And in due course, the comparatively high cost of making these engines would likely be reduced as the actual problems of design, manufacture, and operation were further researched. https://archive.org/details/peacetimeusesofa00mann/page/58/mode/1up?q=%22The+Atomic+Locomotive%22+%22X-12%22 https://archive.org/details/peacetimeusesofa00mann/page/58/m...
- hengheng 2y agoBattery powered trains are a thing. Not all train tracks are electrified, even in Germany, and there are some places where a train line can be extended beyond an electrified segment. They charge through the normal overhead wire with about 1 MW with no extra provisions. https://stadlerrail.com/en/flirt-akku/details/ https://stadlerrail.com/en/flirt-akku/details/ These are new-ish to a point where only train nerds know about them, but they're also old enough to be a fully certified COTS product that you can just buy the way that you buy your normal trains also. Considering how fast that industry moves, I think that is saying something.
- cogman10 2y agoThe fact that all train motors are electric (AFAIK) means that they are somewhat perfect targets for batteries and electrifying. Especially since once the train reaches cruising speed it requires remarkably little input energy. A big battery to absorb the stopping energy and move the train up to cruising speed makes a lot of sense. And it'd be easier/safer to electrify lines as you now just need overhead lines every n miles to keep the batteries charged vs having to line the entire rail with a 3rd rail. You could still have a diesel motor backup, but ultimately you could save tons on fuel costs as it wouldn't be responsible for powering the entire trip.
- kazinator 2y ago> Not all train tracks are electrified That doesn't stop traditional "electric" trains, which actually have diesel engines that drive generators, which drive electric motors.
- algo_trader 2y agoDo you know how they feed a 1MW from the battery to the (AC?) motor ? DO they have a stand alone inverter ? AND a step-up transformer ?
- hengheng 2y agoI do not know. The train has to have an inverter anyways to vary its rpm, and I assume that the motor runs on less than 15 kV anyways. So it could conceivably be done without a separate DC-DC step-up converter, but I wouldn't know for sure.
- pornel 2y agoWhat has Tesla contributed here? The train looks like an existing battery-powered Siemens Mireo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siemens_Mireo#Mireo_Plus_B https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siemens_Mireo#Mireo_Plus_B
- brendoelfrendo 2y agoAll I can find is that the new train replaces a diesel train, and that Tesla took flack last year for running a diesel-electric train as their employee shuttle. Yes, the train is a Siemens Mireo, and I can't find anything that says that Tesla was involved in the development of this specific train at all... so Tesla provided branding, I guess.
- digdugdirk 2y agoI'd say that purchasing a train that runs (at least?) 3x per day and allowing the public to ride for free isn't nothing? Definitely just a money + PR contribution though, I'd be curious of this is just advertising something that was a requirement from local lawmakers for building the factory in the first place.
- drivingmenuts 2y agoThe headline makes it sound like it's a Tesla-made train. If it had been made by Tesla, they would have hyped it into the ground, tried to put it underground, and inspectors would notice a suspicious amount of hacks done just to keep it running. And Elon would have promised a self-driving mode that inexplicably doesn't work with a vehicle that only goes forward and backwards.
- stetrain 2y agoThe only real connection to Tesla is that it's a Tesla-funded employee shuttle to a station on Tesla factory property. The trains are indeed Siemens Miero B and the line is operated by Niederbarnimer Eisenbahn. https://www.railwaygazette.com/passenger/tesla-shuttle-returns-with-battery-trains/67090.article https://www.railwaygazette.com/passenger/tesla-shuttle-retur...
- 2y ago
- rhcom2 2y agoThis reads like a straight PR release
- bdcravens 2y ago> "We are particularly pleased that the Tesla train shuttle is now battery-electric because it is simply in line with our company mission: to accelerate the transition to renewable energies," Theresa Eggler, a project manager at Tesla, told German media outlet rbb24. I did find it amusing a few years ago when I saw a Tesla service vehicle: it was a standard ICE Ford Transit cargo van. (this was before they came out with the EV version of that model)
- 7e 2y agoTesla sells pollution credits to their competitors to delay their EV programs and harm the planet. They completely negate any environmental benefit to buying a Tesla, since the purchase just lets some other manufacturer sell one more dirty SUV. Tesla's mission statement, like all things Musk, is self-serving propaganda.
- vel0city 2y agoDon't worry, the mission statement is no longer propaganda because it no longer exists! https://web.archive.org/web/20240821173050/https://www.tesla.com/blog/secret-tesla-motors-master-plan-just-between-you-and-me https://web.archive.org/web/20240821173050/https://www.tesla...
- AnthonyMouse 2y ago> They completely negate any environmental benefit to buying a Tesla, since the purchase just lets some other manufacturer sell one more dirty SUV. That isn't how that works. If each carmaker is required to sell 20% EVs (or whatever) and then Tesla sells 100% EVs and Chrysler sells 0%, the overall average is still at least 20% and you're still buying an EV. It's not any less "buying an EV" than it would be to buy a Chrysler EV which also allows Chrysler to sell more ICE SUVs. Moreover, the number is the lower limit -- if Tesla sells 100% EVs and Chrysler sells 0% and they each sell the same number of vehicles, you'd then have 50% EVs even if the law only required 20%.
- bryanlarsen 2y agoA program which increases the price of Chrysler ICE vehicles and decreases the price of Tesla EV's is bad for the planet? Note that the alternative to Chrysler paying Tesla is Chrysler paying a fine to the government. If they chose the alternative then only one half of the above statement would be true.
- Hamuko 2y agoSeems overly complicated. Why didn't they just dig a tunnel in the ground where employees could drive Teslas at 55 km/h?
- Animats 2y agoCaltrain is getting something similar from Stadler.[1] They've ordered a trainset that can operate either on overhead wire power or battery power, so that the train can run down to Gilroy, beyond the electrified zone. Charging is done while running on electrified track. A bit of battery range beyond overhead wire isn't rare. SF's electric buses have that. The older models were stuck if they ever got off the wire. Newer ones can pull down the trolleys, drive to a spot under wire, and reconnect. It's a big help when something is blocking the street. [1] https://www.trains.com/trn/news-reviews/news-wire/caltrain-orders-battery-electric-trainset-for-trial-operation/ https://www.trains.com/trn/news-reviews/news-wire/caltrain-o...
- xethos 2y agoThis is just bizarre - even the 20-ish year old trolley buses in Vancouver have backup batteries. They have enough charge to go maybe (maybe) six blocks, but they're also primarily used for vehicle maintenance, line maintenance, detours, and a just in case to make sure the bus will never get stuck on train tracks or similar
- mncharity 2y agoA map[1] - Erkner to "Fangschleuse, Tesla Süd Bhf". The station is still under construction on Google/Bing[2] airphotos, older on Mapquest/Here, forest on Yandex, nothing on Baidu. Googling "Fangschleuse, Tesla Süd Bhf"[3] has a nice set of pictures in the sidebar, which I don't see a way to link to? [1] https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=13/52.39215/13.79668 https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=13/52.39215/13.79668 [2] https://www.bing.com/maps?FORM=Z9LH2&cp=52.392189%7E13.79645&lvl=20.0&style=h https://www.bing.com/maps?FORM=Z9LH2&cp=52.392189%7E13.79645... [3] https://www.google.com/search?q=Fangschleuse%2C+Tesla+S%C3%BCd+Bhf https://www.google.com/search?q=Fangschleuse%2C+Tesla+S%C3%B...
- croes 2y ago>The Giga Train is powered by Siemens Mobility Mireo B battery-electric technology https://cleantechnica.com/2024/09/06/tesla-giga-train-begins-operations-in-germany/ https://cleantechnica.com/2024/09/06/tesla-giga-train-begins...