The Technology

The Railroad Windfarm enables the energy industry, railroads, the manufacturing sector, and service stations to have a smooth transition to a lower carbon future.

 

The Railroad Windfarm combines several successful technologies in a completely unique combination. The underlying premises are trains create wind as they move, most trains run on electricity generated by diesel turbines, and harvesting train’s kinetic, solar, and wind energies.

 

Compared to the options, the mobile Railroad Windfarm is superior to any other power generating technology. It creates jobs while significantly reducing carbon emissions. It’s less expensive, scalable, and can be installed on any train, on any gauge of tracks, anywhere around the world.

 

The Railroad Windfarm is designed to be an economic workhorse. Several ways of conserving fuel result in reduced operating costs and train emissions. It indirectly reduces emissions from autos, energy generation, manufacturing, and trucks. Methane emissions from urban areas can also be reduced.

 

Carbon emissions that cause the Climate Change crisis have been recognized as a dire threat by world leaders. Solutions are in high demand. The philosophy of the Railroad Windfarm, LLC is that fighting Climate Change needs to be profitable to be successful. Its Features, Functions, and Benefits make the Patent appealing to entrepreneurs, the renewable energy industry, and governments.  

 

A growing population, dam removal, increased EV use, and AI data centers coming online, create a demand for more power. This demand could be met by building new fossil fueled power plants that emit several kinds of air pollution. Not a viable option since carbon emissions lead to Climate Change.

 

Nuclear power has no carbon emissions and therefore is touted as a solution to Climate Change. What is ignored is that nuclear waste is radioactive for thousands of years and causes serious environmental impacts from discharging warm water from cooling towers. Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima show that nuclear power is a dangerous technology causing more problems than it solves.

 

Small scale thorium nuclear reactors are another short-sighted technology. Their waste is radioactive for ‘only’ 100 years, but they create a bigger problem. Were small scale nuclear reactors to become common, a Police state would be required to prevent ‘dirty bombs’.

 

The huge risks of nuclear power to public health, safety, the environment, and the loss of personal liberties far outweighs the benefit of zero carbon emissions. These factors, plus astronomical costs and wasted taxpayer dollars, make any kind of nuclear power the opposite of sustainable.

 

So far, stationary solar/wind farms or hydroelectric power have been the best options. Costs fall as efficiency improves. Offshore wind farms are a good option except for the difficulty in building them. Big drawbacks are that stationary wind, and solar farms cause migratory bird deaths. Hydroelectric dams disrupt fish migrations causing depleted populations. The mobile Railroad Windfarm doesn’t cause bird or fish fatalities.

 

Geothermal and tidal or wave energies show promise but haven’t reached commercial scale. When they reach commercial scale insufficient capacity may require expensive new transmission lines. They will need the Railroad Windfarm or have to pay $3-6 million per mile for new transmission lines.

 

Transmission lines increase the initial and ongoing costs of any power plant by adding land acquisition, permitting, and construction costs plus the perpetual costs of maintaining towers and equipment over miles of terrain. There are 160,141 miles of train track in the US. If an equivalent length of transmission lines were built it would cost over $966 Trillion.  

 

Regardless of the technology used, 5% of power is lost by transmission lines. Faulty equipment or high winds often cause wildfires that are typically suppressed with planeloads of possibly cancer-causing fire retardant. Where the terrain is difficult, maintenance is frequently deferred in favor of greater short-term profits.

 

Maintenance on transmission lines is often lackluster even when the terrain isn’t rough. Utilities routinely shut off power to avoid the huge liabilities of catastrophic wildfires caused by poorly maintained transmission lines. Pacific Gas and Electric lost $5.3 Billion in revenue from 2013 to 2020 due to intentional power shut offs.

 

Another application is replacing existing hazardous transmission lines. Large swaths of land can be reforested. Planting trees naturally sequesters carbon and creates wildlife habitat. Spraying of toxic defoliants can be eliminated

 

NIMBY opposition and land use issues are minimized by using existing railroad rights of way to generate and transmit renewable energy. Eliminating litigation and transmission line costs makes out of sight out of mind locations feasible for renewable energy facilities.

 

When stationary wind or solar farms generate more power than the grid can handle they curtail generation. Due to several factors, curtailments vary from .02% to 20%. The mobile Railroad Windfarm eliminates curtailments by diverting surplus energy to the turbines when railcar needs are met.  

 

Without any transmission line losses or curtailments, the mobile Railroad Windfarm technology is 5% to 25% more energy efficient than a similar sized stationary renewable energy facility.

 

The Railroad Windfarm adapts regenerative brakes to railcars to harvest the kinetic energy of a slowing train to generate power. The power charges supercapacitors, then its diverted to charge batteries and/or to help power railcar functions.

 

Zero Emission Refrigerator Railcars eliminate diesel generators. The technology supports offshore wind farms co-located with aquaculture by transmitting the power and using ZERRs to ship the ‘free range’ seafood. Other notable applications are providing EV infrastructure, desalination, and electrolysis. 

 

To help overcome inertia after a complete stop, the stored battery power can be diverted to ‘booster’ traction motors. The extra power and redistribution of the load conserves fuel due to the diesel turbines needing to generate less electricity. As shown on a graph, the huge spike of diesel fuel used during start-ups becomes a much smaller wave.

 

An innovative application of the Patent is temporarily parking groups of wind turbine railcars to form stationary wind farms to harvest historic winds. Power is stored in battery railcars until it’s discharged into the grid. The temporary windfarms are removed when the high wind event is over.

 

Recent technological advances at Stanford enable solar panels to use temperature differentials to generate power at night. At Tsinghua University, Shenzhen, China they use the friction caused by rain on solar panels to generate power. These developments could enhance the Railroad Windfarm.    

Battery capacities continue to rise. When the Patent application was filed railcar battery capacity was 1 Kilowatt. When it was granted, the capacity had increased a thousand-fold to 1 Gigawatt.

 

Lithium-ion batteries need temperature controls and fire suppression equipment. Safer, lower cost battery chemistries than lithium-ion have been announced. The increased safety and reduced cost make the Railroad Windfarm technology even better.   

 

To see a Railroad Windfarm scale model (without airfoils) check out the Photos. To learn how the technology works check out the Video. The focus of this website is on the railcars featured in the Patent. For many additional railcar types and applications see More Options.