Innovations continue to drive fuel efficiencies in rail

I have been following innovations in the rail industry for a long time now, and I still get surprised at how some very simple ideas can create big changes. FuelActive® seems to be one such example.

Fuel Active Limited is a Welsh company from Cardiff, and together with Unipart Rail they are providing their FuelActive® technology to companies such as Colas Rail UK. 

Fuel Active Limited realised that simply by utilising fuel at the top of the fuel tank, rather than the more conventional approach of taking it from the bottom (the latter simplifying the continuance of fuel delivery as the fuel level draws down in the tank), there can be significant fuel efficiency and maintenance cost savings. That is because the fuel at the top of the tank will be cleaner than the fuel at the bottom of the tank, and with clean fuel, a better combustion is possible. This leads to lower fuel consumption and higher power efficiencies, alongside a cleaner engine operation in general, whereby maintenance tasks such as oil and fuel filter changes can be less frequent! To achieve this, they have developed a floating fuel pickup device which is installed in the fuel tank, and thus it is a relatively simple retrofit. 

In trials of this system, Colas Rail UK reports that they have been able to achieve up to 7% reductions of fuel consumption and carbon emissions. Such numbers for something so simple is fantastic!

Given that the switch to electric, hydrogen, fuel cell and battery trains is anything but an overnight process, achieving such significant levels of improvements for existing diesel trains is very impressive.

With any improvement of this scale, there will usually be a downside. For example, I can envision that just taking the fuel from the top of the tank will ultimately lead to a greater accumulation of dirt within the fuel at the bottom of the tank. However, I note from their website that this is not a problem as any such contamination that might accumulate at the bottom of the fuel tank is removed periodically in any event during planned maintenance procedures.

It will be interesting to see if this technology gets wider use across our railways and other transport systems.

I am pleased to see that they have filed patent applications for their technology. Have you developed technology that could be utilised to improve the efficiencies of existing technology? We would be pleased to discuss how we may be able to help you to secure your IP protection for it.

#Rail #Transport #NetZero #ClimateChange #Innovation #Patents #Designs #technology