Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson | Getty Images) Earth Day is April 22, and its usual message—take care of our planet—has been given added urgency by the challenges highlighted in the latest IPCC report. This year, Ars is taking a look at the technologies we normally cover, from cars to chipmaking, and finding out how we […]
Enlarge (credit: Wabtec) Battery-electric power is commonplace in cars and trucks and is being tested in planes, helicopters, and container ships. Now, battery power is coming to trains, in place of the diesel-fueled generators that have powered locomotives for more than a century. Last week, Union Pacific Railroad agreed to buy 20 battery-electric freight locomotives […]
Enlarge / Two Parallel Systems rail vehicles transport a container down a test track in Southern California. (credit: Parallel Systems) For the last 200 years, freight trains haven’t changed much; massive locomotives still move relatively dumb freight cars. Certainly, rail fans could argue that plenty has changed—they’re not wrong! —but from a distance, trains work […]
Enlarge (credit: SNCF) Every year, the Journées Européennes Patrimoine (European Heritage Days) weekend in September offers visitors a chance to visit numerous monuments all over Europe. Among the attractions in Paris this year was an orange-colored electric train with a name that has become a byword for speed and cutting-edge technology: the particular TGV. Thousands […]
Enlarge / Tourists enjoy a walk on Lake Baikal in March 2021. (credit: Natalia Fedosenko/TASS/Getty Images) On the shore of Lake Baikal, deep in eastern Siberia, one of the most ambitious feats of modern Russian rail engineering is nearing completion. The Baikalsky tunnel, carved through 7km of mountain rock, has taken seven years to build, […]
Enlarge / Using hydrogen in some of these applications probably makes more sense than building out a network of hydrogen filling stations for passenger cars. (credit: Scharfsinn86/Getty Images) In just the last week, General Motors signed agreements with not one but two companies to develop applications for its Hydrotec hydrogen fuel cell systems. At first […]
Credit to the NHL, in that its summer bubble went off about as smoothly as could be imagined, allowing the league to complete its playoffs and award the Stanley Cup. Betting that the NHL wouldn’t be able to get through anything without fucking up royally was a very chalky play, so it was a real […]