220-mph Solar-Powered Train Proposed In Arizona 416
Mike writes "An ambitious Arizona company has recently revealed plans for a solar powered bullet train that will streak across the desert at 220 mph, traveling from Tuscon to Phoenix in 30 minutes flat. Proposed by Solar Bullet LLC, the system comprises a series of tracks that would serve stations including Chandler, Casa Grande, Red Rock, and Marana, and may one day be extended to Flagstaff and Nogales. The train would require 110 megawatts of electricity, which would be generated by solar panels mounted above the tracks." Local coverage of the plan takes a harder look, noting that Solar Bullet LLC is two guys who are now asking local governments in the towns at which such a train would potentially stop for $35K for a legal and feasibility study. Total cost is estimated at $27B.
Dumb idea. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Interesting (Score:3, Interesting)
I agree - and that's why I say the cost has to be lower. When I still lived in Phoenix a few years ago I was tired of driving my commute so I looked into public transit. It had the other costs you mention, plus it cost more monetarily. It just didn't make sense. For people to put up with the other issues they must either have no other choice, or it has to be cheaper.
That's a good point about the water. I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of the people living in places like Las Vegas or Phoenix don't even realize that they live in an artificial environment. The day the water stops coming from up north, they either move or die. PBS did a great documentary based on Reisner's Cadillac Desert [wikipedia.org] that does a great job highlighting some of these issues. That's a whole other can of worms.
But as of right now the growth between Phoenix and Tucson is unreal. My sister lives in Casa Grande now and last time I visited I was just stunned. When I was a kid there was nothing down there. Now, thousands of homes, the strip malls, all of it. It's bizarre to see. I'm not sure what all the people do down there. In Tucson there is the University, Raytheon and a few others. In between there's the prison and I don't know what else.
Well $27B buys you a lot of panels... (Score:4, Interesting)
Hmm. Perhaps.
I have 48 solar panels on my roof in northern CA. Yesterday they generated 45 kWH between them. Figure that the middle of the desert is actually a better solar energy source and bump that to (say) 60, and the multiplier becomes 110,000 / 60 = ~1800 times as many panels or 86,400.
There's ~116 miles between Tucson and Phoenix. That's ~750 panels per mile. It's a lot, but it's not unfeasible.
I'm not saying your concerns aren't valid, I think some of them are, but the energy side could be made to work. They ought to get a significant discount on the price (~ $1k/panel) if they're ordering circa 90,000 of them, which should help their cost-benefit analysis :)
Simon.
Re:How much?!?! (Score:5, Interesting)
Seriously, this is a rather larger undertaking. Generating 110 megawatts (per train, I imagine?) is no small feat. Especially for solar paneling. That's usually the type of thing you need your own power plant for. It's a nice idea, but you'll forgive me if I'm a bit skeptical of:
a) Solar Power only above the rails being effective
b) The practicality of any design that relied only on the rail footprint
Hmm, well let's do a little napkin engineering here and guestimate the footprint needed. Let's start with standard 1000 W/m^2 solar irradiance, and assume 2m wide cells over the rails. With that you'd need solar panels over 55km of track. Easy-peasy. Now assume inexpensive thin film cells at about 10% efficiency -- then you need 550km of over-rail cells. Which is longer than the rail from Phoenix to Tuscon would be.
If they could afford 30% efficient cells, then it'd be 183km, which is about the distance from Tuscon to Phoenix. For one car. If they have a pair of tracks, then they could have one going in both directions at all times. Is one train every 30 mins, for a 30 min trip, reasonable? Doesn't seem any worse than normal trains today. So I'm going to call this one barely feasible, physically. Economically? That's a whole 'nother ball of wax.
Re:Well $27B buys you a lot of panels... (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm going to review your physics.
If you installation produced 45 KWH of ENERGY during a 5 hour period (being conservative here), it's average output POWER was 9KW. Let's say 10KW to simplify the math.
Now, you will need 11000 times as many panels to reach 110MW. The total number of panels per mile you need is 48*11000/116=4551. That is one panel every 14 inches (if i got the units right, not used to imperial).
Feasible? I would say it still is, but not as much as your calculations suggested
Re:This is what the "new green economy" is all abo (Score:3, Interesting)
Regardless of expense, I'm excited (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Well $27B buys you a lot of panels... (Score:3, Interesting)
Running the figures through Google math, starting with a 60"x42" panel generating 55W at peak, I calculate a 116 mile x 2 meter strip of solar panels would generate ~12MW. That's an order of magnitude short... I don't know what kind of duty cycle the 110MW is required at, but if that's continuous to run the train line, it's only going to be able to operate for an hour a day.
It's enough to make one suspicious about feasibility, anyway.
Re:Dumb idea. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Interesting (Score:2, Interesting)
You forgot Los Angeles. One of the world's most populated regions runs almost entirely on water pumped from Northern California. One day, something will happen to that system and there will be tens of millions of people without drinking water. Already it is being threatened heavily by overuse up here in NoCal — ag allotments are WAY overallocated and a lot of vineyards whose grapes were killed off by this crazy early heat/late frost cycle have been pumping out their allotment and then some, loading it into trucks, and shipping it in some cases halfway across the damn state. Normally a percentage of the water pumped for irrigation goes back into the ground...
Re:Interesting (Score:3, Interesting)
You have to watch Blaine all the time, Blaine is a pain, and that is the truth.
Train stations have a tendency to encourage growth (Score:3, Interesting)
Pretty much anytime a train station is built, be it metro, or longer commuter trains, local business and housing growth ensues. - Why? - because people want to live by trains/metros. Building a train station there wil decrease sprawl.