For Sun-Ways, railways represent an untapped opportunity for renewable electricity generation. The firm, based near Lausanne, recently installed 100 metres of photovoltaic (PV) panels on a railway line in Buttes, in the canton of Neuchâtel in western Switzerland.
Inaugurated on 24 April, the 48-panel power plant has forecast production of about 16 megawatt-hours (MWh) per year. It was installed using an adapted track replacement train, which placed the panels between the rails of the standard gauge (1,435mm) track. Sun-Ways says the train, from rail maintenance specialist Scheuchzer, could eventually install up to 1,000m2 of panels per day.
The company hopes that success with the £0.5m project could lead to much wider deployment around the country – and the world.
Panel discussion
Speaking to Professional Engineering, CEO Joseph Scuderi says he is driven by an ambition to contribute to the energy transition, to “give something good for the planet” and his grandchildren.
“If each house owner placed panels on his roof, it will be fantastic for all the planet. But for that, you have to convince millions and millions of houseowners,” says Scuderi, who previously worked for utility company Romande Energie.
“I'm not a competitor of other methods of installing PV panels, but… you can use the railway for its own advantages.”
These include speed and ease of installation using the Scheuchzer machine, which Sun-Ways hopes could be used for smooth and partially automated deployment in future. The train could deliver the panels to a railway installation site and be ready for work in just one day, Scuderi claims. He is discussing another iteration of the installation vehicle, which could be smaller and more bespoke, with the local partner company.
Another motivation is the relative simplicity of securing a contract to install along a railway, in contrast to the multitude of agreements that would be needed, for example, to build solar farms in the fields adjoining a track.
Other projects have explored similar concepts, but Scuderi says that Sun-Ways is the first to focus on easy removal of the PV panels, to enable maintenance of the railway. That process will also use the Scheuchzer vehicle.
The panels themselves use standard technology that is readily available on the market, the CEO says. With electrical connections contained inside the panels, they are held in place by a hook system, designed for stability when trains pass at up to 150km/h (93mph). That speed opens up roughly half of the market, although trains on the Buttes line will only travel at up to 70km/h (43mph). The panels, which will be cleaned by brushes attached to the back of passing trains, are also designed to remain stable in winds of up to 240km/h (149mph).
Rolling on sunshine
Sun-Ways and partners will gather data during the three-year project, during which two trains an hour will travel over the power plant. Potential concerns could include glare from the panels distracting train drivers, which the company said it is tackling with anti-reflective filters. It also plans to conduct glare analysis before installation of future projects, as is already the practice for solar farms near railway tracks.
Scuderi hopes the system could be installed in the same way around the world, with small adaptations for gauge where needed. Different countries should be able to use their own PV panels, he adds, to accelerate deployment.
“I can send you the pilot project to install it, and you can do all the tests for your own regulations,” he says. “I don't have to wait the end of my pilot project in Switzerland.”
If successful pilot projects are rolled out in other countries in the next two years, Scuderi claims it could eventually lead to solar power plants being installed on as much as 10-20% of global railway tracks in roughly 10 years.
Such a target might seem wildly ambitious, but the CEO claims the company has been “inundated” with enquiries from around the world since the opening of the Buttes project, and it has started to sign some collaboration agreements. He is in conversation with interested partners in Mexico and Canada, which has almost 50,000km (31,000mph) of track, and he has spoken to a company in the UK.
“When you have one partner that has the competencies, the finance and the willingness to go ahead, with this technology you just need some machines, and then all the PV panels are already in the market,” he says. “You can build it rapidly, because we use something very common.”
The company has also spoken to the South Korean government, Scuderi says, but there the panels would need to be compatible with trains travelling at up to 300km/h (186mph). Improvements are being planned to enable that, but the CEO says he is unable to give further details before an upcoming patent application.
The current panels can be installed on curved tracks as well as straight, he says. With the company estimating 260,000km² of ‘unused’ land between tracks in Europe, and 1,000,000km² around the world, it hopes the power plants could make a significant contribution to the net zero transition.
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Content published by Professional Engineering does not necessarily represent the views of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.