Amtrak is preparing to add as many as 70 electric locomotives to its already existing cluster of trains from 2013 to 2019. The government-owned corporation has plans to buy these new trains for use on the Northeast corridor between Washington and Boston and the Keystone Corridor between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Siemens AG is building these new trains on a design it already sells in Europe.
The 70 new locomotives that will be replacing 64 locomotives, some of which date to 1980 and have 3.5 million miles on the odometer have a peak power of 10,000 horsepower and draw over 5 megawatts. All these new trains are said to include the feature of regenerative braking, where the energy producing while stopping is stored into a storage battery and used whenever required.
Siemens will be constructing most of the new locomotives in a factory in Sacramento, Calif., with 2 megawatts of solar cells on the roof and they will start arriving in February 2013. This green initiative will set Amtrak back by $466 million.
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