Studies are under way to get a fuel cell-powered, nonpolluting, low-noise train into service by about 2010, the Railway Technical Research Institute said Monday.
The RTRI fuel cell-driven train development program has been making steady progress and in February successfully test-drove a prototype bogie--a wheel system powered by fuel cells, institute officials said.
The institute plans to build an experimental fuel cell-powered train to run on RTRI's test tracks in Kunitachi, western Tokyo, in the near future.
The institute has engaged in research and development on fuel-cell trains since 2001, when it successfully ran a mini-train powered by fuel cells with an output of one kilowatt-hour with one person aboard.
The RTRI was established in 1987 following the privatization of Japanese National Railways as a joint R & D institute of the seven Japan Railway companies. Among its major projects is the development of a Maglev (magnetic levitation) system, yomiuri.co.jp reported.
The prototype bogie tested in February used a fuel-cell system with an output of 30 kilowatt-hours, and showed a top speed of 30 kph, the institute said.
The fuel-cell system being tested in the RTRI project is basically the same as that used in automobiles, designed to generate electric power through a reaction between hydrogen in a cylinder and oxygen in the air.
The only by-product of the reaction is water, while the electric-powered motor produces far less noise than a diesel engine, according to the institute.
The fuel-cell train now envisioned by RTRI will consist of two cars, one equipped with a set of four motors, a transformer and a battery, and the other equipped with fuel cells and a hydrogen cylinder.
The vehicle will be able to run at a maximum speed of 120 kph and travel a maximum of 300 to 400 kilometers before the hydrogen cylinder needs replacing.
A major hurdle to be cleared before the planned fuel cell-powered train can be put into service is to boost the fuel cells' efficiency, according to Kenichi Uruga, chief of the institute's Vehicle Control Technology Department.
To run a couple of carriages, fuel cells capable of turning out 600 kilowatt-hours of electricity are needed, he said.
Fuel cells capable of producing that amount of electricity currently available are too large to be set up in the envisaged vehicle, Uruga said.
"We need to reduce the size of fuel cells by about two-thirds to overcome the hurdle," he said.
The application of a fuel cell-powered vehicle depends largely on progress in developments by fuel-cell manufacturers. Uruga added, "Given the remarkably rapid advances in fuel-cell technology in recent years, we believe our fuel cell-powered train program is feasible."

Wind and solar power and small hydroelectric plants do not produce greenhouse gases.

Many business people are worried about efforts to tackle climate change.
Some of the key tools to curb greenhouse gas emissions could raise the cost of energy.
Carbon taxes or the capping of industrial emissions could raise costs.
Some businesses, like BP, say they have saved money by improving their own energy efficiency.
But there is a whole group of businesses that stand to do very well out of the climate change agenda.
The fact that the Kyoto Protocol comes into force in February - imposing limits on most developed countries' emissions - means those opportunities may be close at hand.
Take electricity generation.
Wind and solar power and small hydroelectric plants do not produce greenhouse gases. (Nor do nuclear or large hydroelectric projects, but they are more controversial for other environmental reasons.)

No Complaints
These "renewable" energies account for a very small proportion of current worldwide power generation, but they are likely to grow, bbc.co.uk reported.
Companies in these businesses see a huge opportunity ahead of them.
This is not a sector where people will express a hint of doubt about the science of climate change--which other business people sometimes do.
Econergy provides advice and investment funds for what chief executive Tom Stoner calls clean energy.
Wind and solar feature and there is one project which involves burning waste from a sawmill to produce electricity; it is waste that would otherwise rot or be burned and give off greenhouse gases anyway.
He says developing countries need investment in their energy infrastructure, otherwise they will not develop.
Nevertheless, it needs to be clean energy he says; the world cannot afford the additional emissions if developing countries grow on the basis of fossil fuels.
And of course businesses like his will thrive in an environment where that approach is widely believed.

Efficient Energy
And there is the unglamorous business of using energy efficiently.
The European Insulation Manufacturers' Association has sent its boss, Horst Biedermann, here to Buenos Aires.
He says that in the European Union buildings produce more emissions - 40% of the total--than either transport or industry.
The firms he represents can fix that problem.
He acknowledges that making insulation produces a lot of greenhouse gas--because glass or stone has to be heated to high temperatures before it is made into mineral wool.
But, when installed, the savings are greater by a factor of 20, he says.
So, for sure there are some businesses who see the effort to tackle climate change as cloud on the horizon. But for a few, it is a little ray of sunshine.

It is estimated that a sea area of 150,000 square kilometers with a water depth of less than 35 meters could be available for offshore wind--and provide enough power to satisfy all of Europe's electricity demand. In Europe, offshore wind farms represent just 1.8 percent of current installed wind capacity; however the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) industry target sets out an increase to 13 percent by 2010 and 39 percent by 2020--a total of 70 GW within 16 years. It is stating a simple truth that the offshore wind industry can challenge the oil and gas sectors on their home territory.
Governments have recognized the opportunity. Just over two years ago, Ministers from Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK met in Bergen for the Fifth International Conference of the North Sea. They expressed concern "about the effects that climate change may have on the North Sea ecosystem and the threat it may pose to the population living on the North Sea coasts" and emphasized "the need to develop safe renewable energy solutions". The Ministerial Declaration prioritized offshore wind energy as having "the potential to make a significant contribution to tackling the problems of climate change."
For the successful implementation of offshore wind energy, however, three key barriers must be tackled. First of all, there are no physical grids present at sea to connect large-scale offshore wind energy. Second, there is a lack of international cooperation over the conducting of Environmental Impact Statements, renewableenergyaccess.com reported.
Thirdly, one of the principal barriers to the full scale exploitation of offshore wind electricity, and also for the creation of a well functioning EU Internal Electricity Market, lies in the way the electricity markets in Europe are operated at present. Strictly organized on a national or regional basis within states, they are breeding grounds for national and regional electricity monopolies or oligopolies. For large-scale offshore wind power, access to sell electricity to several markets is crucial. Cross-border electricity interconnections are also vital for the overall goal of a well functioning Internal Electricity Market. The lack of a transparent European market for electricity is a barrier to the development of offshore wind energy. As the European Commission's recent Communication on renewables said: "It is important to ensure that the development of offshore wind is not stifled by a false assessment of potential problems".
Governments have successfully solved these types of issues before. The general climate facing offshore wind bears striking similarity to that faced by the planners and policy makers who sought to explore Europe's offshore natural gas resources. But whilst the boom in the oil and gas reserves of the North Sea is now coming to an end, we have discovered a huge new energy resource that has been there all along, and only waiting for our ability to exploit it.
Offshore wind technology is progressing fast, but it needs to do so in tandem with a policy framework as positive as that which promoted the oil and gas sector from the 1960s onwards.Mainstream energy analysis indicates what is at stake for European security of supply. Europe's energy imports are set to rise from 50 to 70 percent, demand for oil and gas is increasing worldwide and at the same time supply is constrained, with oil and gas reserves concentrated in Russia, the Caspian Sea region and the Middle East. Yet all studies suggest that electricity will continue to play a large role in Europe's energy future, with half of the projected increase in gas demand coming from electricity.
These factors exacerbate the inherent volatility of oil and gas prices, which are inflicting a multi-billion dollar drain on the global economy. A strategy of reliance on imported energy resources at unpredictable prices inevitably requires the assurance of political and economic stability in producer countries--Iraq highlights how big a challenge this is. Stabilizing Europe's grids to accommodate large amounts of wind electricity from the sea would require far less political capital.

Rio Tinto Group, Xstrata Plc and other coal producers in northeast Australia forecast a doubling of exports through Dalrymple Bay port in four years, pressuring the terminal's operator to add more capacity.
The miners that use Dalrymple Bay this week told operator Prime Infrastructure Group they want to ship 87 million metric tons a year by about 2008, up from 43.6 million in the year ended June 30, Prime Chief Executive Chris Chapman said. Prime doesn't consider the growth is sustainable, he said.
Global trade in coking coal, which accounts for about 80 percent of Dalrymple Bay's exports, is expected to rise by half by 2010, BHP Billiton has said. Australian exports of the fuel are expected to rise 7 percent this year as economic growth in China fuels a surge in demand for steel from Asian producers.
"We're cautioning a bit of restraint," Chapman told reporters at the terminal. "We're questioning China--how sustainable is that growth? We don't want to overbuild capacity because we will be left'' with the risk of investing in plant that isn't used.
Prime last year boosted capacity at the terminal to 56 million tons a year and is studying three expansion options, all of which include an initial increase to 60 million tons by Christmas 2005.

Anglo, BHP, Peabody
Dalrymple Bay handles almost a quarter of the coal shipped from Australia and almost 5 percent of global trade in coking coal, the type used by steelmakers. Anglo American Plc, BHP Billiton Mitsubishi Alliance, Peabody Energy Corp. and Macarthur Coal Ltd. also export coal through the terminal, Bloomberg.com reported.
"It depends a lot on what China does in terms of metallurgical coal imports," said Greg Dean-Jones, a coal analyst at AME Mineral Economics in Sydney. "But there are other fish in the sea--Canada is also ramping up production and the US still has a lot of coal--so 87 million tons would seem to be a very optimistic production forecast."
Coal buyers and sellers may have to accept longer ship- loading times, which incur additional costs, rather than having access to all the requested capacity, Chapman said.
"Maybe demurrage is the way to go rather than overbuilding," he said. The terminal's capacity is fully contracted only until 2008, he said.

Queue of Ships
The queue of ships waiting to load at Dalrymple Bay, south of Mackay in Queensland state, has climbed to more than 40 at times in the second half of this year, from a normal queue of four to six, said Greg Smith, general manager, operations at Prime. The queue surged from July to a peak of 49 in mid-August, largely as a result of exporters committing to selling more than they could export, he said.
"They were accepting any nominations rather than lose the sale," Smith said. "The queue has got nothing to do with terminal capacity if you purposely over-sell."
Japanese steelmakers agreed to pay BHP Billion about $125 a ton for the fuel next year, up from $56 a ton in 2004-05, officials at Nippon Steel Ltd. and Sumitomo Metal Industries Ltd. said on Dec. 13.
About 25 ships were waiting off the terminal yesterday to load coal. Each vessel will wait about eleven days to load, compared with about three normally, Smith said.
In August exporters committed to selling about 5.7 million tons of coal, compared with a contracted capacity at the terminal of about 4.8 million tons, Prime said in a presentation to reporters yesterday. Since then, exporters have continued to over- commit on sales, the presentation shows.

Demand for energy in South Korea is likely to grow 3.2 percent next year, matching this year's expected rise, but a slowing economy may make that difficult to achieve, an influential energy think tank said on Tuesday.
South Korea's export-oriented economy, the third-largest in Asia, has been mired in a two-year slump in consumer spending, slowing growth in energy consumption.
The economic weakness has led the state-funded think tank, Korea Energy Economics Institute, to repeatedly revise down its energy demand forecasts over the past year.
Its current projected growth for energy demand of 3.2 percent this year was revised down from 3.3 percent predictde in August. Late last year it had expected energy demand growth of 5.0 percent this year.
South Korea, which has to import almost all of its energy needs, is the world's fourth-biggest importer of oil.
"We do not expect the economy to be in a good shape next year," said Park Kwang-soo, an economist at the institute, asia.news.yahoo.com reported.
"The 2005 energy demand forecast was based on economic growth of 4.5 percent, but the outlooks I've seen recently have been more pessimistic, Reuters reported."
South Korea's central bank warned last week cooling export growth and sluggish spending at home would slow economic growth to 4.0 percent next year from a projected 4.7 percent this year.
Energy demand for 2005, including oil, coal, natural gas and nuclear energy, was expected to grow 3.2 percent to 229 million tonnes of oil equivalent (TOE), the institute said in a report.
Energy demand for this year was projected to grow 3.2 percent to 222 million TOE, it said.
South Koreans were expected to consume 1.2 percent more petroleum products in 2005, reversing direction after a 0.2 percent contraction forecast for this year, it said.
Soaring global oil prices weighed on domestic oil consumption this year, it said. Benchmark US light crude oil prices have gained 26 percent so far this year.
"Sharp rises in oil prices have already been priced in, so we don't think oil prices would hurt demand sentiment that much next year," Park said.
Demand for natural gas was forecast to grow 2.9 percent, slowing from sharp growth of 16 percent this year, the institute said.