Alstom’s Coradia iLint Successfully Travels 1,175 km Without Refueling Its Hydrogen Tank
The title of this post, is the same as that of this press release from Alstom.
This paragraph describes the trip.
Alstom, global leader in smart and sustainable mobility, has demonstrated the effectiveness of its hydrogen powered solutions for long distance transportation. During a long-distance journey, an unmodified serially-produced Coradia iLint train covered 1,175 kilometres without refuelling the hydrogen tank, only emitting water and operating with very low levels of noise. The vehicle used for this journey comes from the fleet belonging to LNVG (Landesnahverkehrsgesellschaft Niedersachsen), the transport authority of Lower Saxony, and has been in regular passenger operation on the network of evb (Eisenbahnen und Verkehrsbetriebe Elbe-Weser GmbH) since mid-August. For the project, Alstom also partnered with the gas and engineering company Linde.
The distance is around 730 miles.
This paragraph describes the detailed route.
Starting in Bremervörde, the route took the Coradia iLint across Germany. From Lower Saxony, where the hydrogen train was built and developed by Alstom, it travelled through Hesse to Bavaria, all the way to Burghausen near the German-Austrian border before coming to a stop in Munich. Following this remarkable journey, the train will now head for the German capital. Several trips through Berlin are on the agenda as part of InnoTrans 2022, the premier International Trade Fair for Transport Technology, to be held from 20 to 23 September.
It looks to be a good test of a hydrogen-powered train.
It looks like Alstom believe that hydrogen trains can replace diesel ones, providing there is a source of hydrogen.
The Anonymous Widower 
This clearly demonstrates that there is no question that hydrogen fuelled trains can deliver as long you ignore the costs involved in producing the hydrogen and the extra capital costs of the kit but if we really want to decarbonise that is the price. As ive said before if we had a WW2 mentality towards this we would just make it happen with efficiency improvements along the way.
Comment by Nicholas Lewis | September 17, 2022 |
I find Cummins part in all this gratifying.
They supply the fuel-cells for the iLint and they are also being successful with the roll-out of their hydrogen internal combustion engines.
It show how a large company can decarbonise successfully.
Hydrogen is a cummin!
Comment by AnonW | September 18, 2022 |
Meanwhile in Bowness
As Nicholas Lewis says hydrogen still has some hills to climb regarding production costs as well as defining the optimum operating conditions that make its application viable.
Comment by fammorris | September 18, 2022 |
I hope this link to the operation of the Ballard Motive Solutions (formerly Arcola Energy) Class 614, finally running a couple of weeks ago on the track at Bowness, works
Comment by fammorris | September 18, 2022 |
I see that the transport authority in Lower Saxony, after spending €93m (+€8.4m from the federal government) on the iLints running on a couple of routes, has now decided to go with batteries on the remainder of its diesel routes https://www.hydrogeninsight.com/transport/no-more-hydrogen-trains-rail-company-that-launched-worlds-first-h2-line-last-year-opts-for-all-electric-future/2-1-1495801 Along with everyone else, they’ve decided hydrogen is simply too expensive. Their plan is for the diesels to be replaced by 2037.
Comment by Peter Robins | August 4, 2023 |
Yes just like Baden-Wurdenberg transport authority they’ve decided that the conomics; i.e. the production costs, maintenance costs, the energy requirements of the vehicles and CO2 emissions just make the hydrogen option impractical.
I’m sure Alstom and the leasing company involved in the hydrogen Aventra project are having second thoughts.
Comment by fammorris | August 4, 2023 |
The other early order for hydrogen trains, the Zillertalbahn in Austria, is going nowhere, mired in controversy. The supplier, Stadler, recently stated that they reckoned that over the life-span of the units putting OLE up on the line would be cheaper than using hydrogen. Of course, Stadler’s no doubt happy to supply whatever traction their customers want.
Comment by Peter Robins | August 4, 2023
I’d forgotten about the Zillertalbahn, however on looking further I found a couple of articles from late June in which, despite the controversy regarding the initial selection of a hydrogen powered solution, it seems they’ve decided to go ahead with it.
I particularly liked the German title of the article…….
“Der Stoff, aus dem die Zillertaler Träume sind
Zillertalbahn soll von Diesel auf Wasserstoffantrieb umgerüstet werden. Regierung präsentiert Fahrplan.”
I just wonder if it’ll turn out to be an “Alptraum”
BTW I’m embarrassed that in my last post I managed to misspell Baden Württemberg. You’d think that as someone who for two decades had worked for a company based there I’d get it right.
Comment by fammorris | August 5, 2023
The debate’s still rumbling on. The Tirol government has come out in favour, but they need funding from the national government, and https://www.sn.at/wirtschaft/oesterreich/zillertaler-wasserstoffbahn-landesregierung-bleibt-dabei-142937755 (from Wednesday) reports that they want a new independent review “in order to restore confidence in the project”. It seems the original decision in favour of hydrogen failed to properly assess battery power, and was partly based on input from someone who falsely claimed to have a doctorate.
Meanwhile the current diesels may well not last much beyond 2028.
Hydropower in the valley apparently produces 7x as much power as is needed locally, so that should not be an issue.
Comment by Peter Robins | August 5, 2023
As you all know, I’ve ridden the iLints.
They work, but as a development of an existing train, they are not the best of designs.
I very much feel that a clean sheet design would be much better.
Hopefully, Alstom’s three-car hydrogen Aventra will be much better.
Comment by AnonW | August 5, 2023 |
Well Alstom’s three-car hydrogen Aventra can hardly be regarded as a fresh design, it being a derivative of a vehicle platform that goes back to 2014. Classes 701, 710, 720, 730 as well as
the 345 are all Aventra based platforms. You’ll be better placed than me to comment on these trains but I’m sure you’ll agree there’s a fair bit of variability in the success of these vehicles.
I note that neither Eversholt nor Alstom have publicly commented on progress since agreeing a MOU 20 months ago
Comment by fammorris | August 5, 2023 |
Some of the reports about the Aventra’s design in the early days, indicated that it could take batteries or superconductors. They also announced that a 125 mph bi-mode train was possible.
I wouldn’t be surprised to find, that Bombardier thought long and hard about alternative power, when they designed the train.
This post dates from 2013.
Note though that Alstom use Cummins fuel cells in the iLint and Wrightbus use Ballard.
Note too, that the Class 720’s appear to have just under 600 KW per motored car.
I don’t think that Alstom would change to hydrogen internal combustion engines because of the noise and vibration.
Comment by AnonW | August 5, 2023 |
Alstom is currently building 12 H-powered Coradia Polyvalents for the SNCF https://www.sncf.com/en/commitments/csr-priorities/sncf-accelerates-hydrogen-train Testing should start towards the end of the year. These are different from the iLints, as they have catenaries and can recharge batteries from the wires. I read somewhere that the Germans didn’t want that, because of concern that sparks from the OLE could ignite the hydrogen, stored on the roof. The Polyvalents also store the H on the roof, so presumably the French don’t consider that too much of a risk.
Comment by Peter Robins | August 5, 2023 |