Hydrogen as a Rail Mass Transit Fuel

There is a continually growing need for mass transport and along with customer desire for greater comfort and speed, its consumption of energy will grow faster still. The fiscal cost of energy plus global warming has spurred efficiency improvement and thoughts now concentrate on fuels. In the UK for major lines for trains, this is electricity generated in a benign fashion in large facilities nominally remote from the train and track. Electric trains tend to be lighter, hence more efficient and demand less maintenance than their diesel counterpart. Similar arguments, including pollution emissions apply to city mass transit systems. For medium density and lower density routes, whether fuel cells or the next generation of IC or GT engines are employed, hydrogen is a prime energy candidate and here we examine its feed, production, distribution, and application, including generator location. Hydrogen from steam hydrocarbon reformers have even been installed in ships. Other countries have similar desires to those of the UK, including Saudi Arabia, but their problems are different and outline examples from Australia and Saudi Arabia are included.