Pretty cool - World's first biogas train ready to roll in Sweden

[Stockholm]

by Sophie Mongalvy

STOCKHOLM, June 17 (AFP) - The world's first train to run on biogas, a renewable energy source made up of organic waste, will be inaugurated on Monday in Sweden, a country that has high hopes for biofuels. The train will link the city of Linkoeping, just south of Stockholm, to the east coast town of Vaestervik some 80 kilometers (50 miles) away. It consists of a single carriage that seats 54 passengers.

"This is the first train in the world driven by biogas," Carl Lilliehoeoek, the head of the company Svensk Biogas that owns the train, told AFP.

The vehicle is a converted old Fiat train whose diesel engines have been replaced by two Volvo gas engines, he said.

The engine was replaced "so that the train would be more environmentally friendly", since the combustion of biogas, like other biofuels, helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

http://www.sweden.se/templates/cs/AFPNews____2078.aspx?newsid=//www.nobicon.se/afp_si.nsf/js.latest/80633FF508EB4433C125702300152059

[trotsky]

1. (Insert flatulence joke here.) n/t

[jpak]

2. more

<snip>

The Scandinavian country, home to nine million people, currently has 779 biogas buses and more than 4,500 cars that run on a mixture of petrol and either biogas or natural gas, according to the Swedish environment ministry.

<end snip>

Thanks for posting this...

:)

[suneel112]

3. By far, the best energy source

for trains is renewable, green Electricity. If humanity wants to survive, they need to give up a 0.6% efficiency in absorbing solar energy (the efficiency of photosynthesis, which is the beginning of biomass energy) and go for a 60% efficiency (the efficiency of future photovoltaic panels, directly converting solar energy into its most usable form, electricity). This alone will be a revolution equivalent to that of the agricultural revolution.