Trains archives: Diesel-electric loco connected to electric power grid for emergency power?

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

I think after this question that I’ll be all out of questions for the forum. [<:o)]

I seem to remember a photo in Trains years ago (circa 1990?) that showed a locomotive connected to a city’s electric power grid for emergency power (using the loco’s main generator). Or, maybe it was connected to a large building complex?? Anyway, it was pretty unusual and struck me as a pretty interesting solution. I’d love to read about it again, but have no idea where to find it.

Does anyone else recall this, and can anyone provide the citation? I really need to buy the Trains CD so that I can answer my own research questions. Please excuse my laziness in this instance…

Thanks for the help!

2

I think it was a CN or CP locomotive hooked up to a hospital during a blizzard.

If I remember, they dropped panel track on the street and ran it right up beside the building and used it to power emergency equipment for the hospital.

Search using CN or CP and hospital as key words…

3

Ok thanks, Ed. Thanks to your hints, I found it. It was in Trains April 1998, page 18.

The story was discussed in this previous thread: Locomotives as emergency portable generators?

Interesting thing was that they ran the locomotive down a paved street under its own power. No panel track… wow.

Quoted post from previous thread:

williamsb replied on 06-27-2007 10:32 PM

I knew I kept all these magazines for a reason. The news article is in Trains April 1998 page 18.CN MLW M420W 3502 was derailed in the Montreal suburb of Boucherville and moved under its own power 400 feet down the middle of a paved street to serve as a portable generator for the town’s civic buildings.

There was a huge ice storm that knocked out the power to 1.35 million customers taking in all of southwest Quebec, plus some adjoining areas of Ontario, New York state and Vermont in January 1998. It took several weeks to get all the power back. Our daughter and her family servived that storm in Ontario.

4

CN loco at a school as I recall, from the massive ice storm that hit Quebec and northern NY circa 1997-1998 and wrecked both the long-distance transmission lines and local distribution network for several months.

  • Paul North.
5

Meanwhile, I found this Wikipedia article (usual disclaimers apply):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_ice_storm_of_1998 (January)

which in about the middle of the page says this about the locomotives:

“In addition to help residents, CN locomotives (CN3502 and CN3555) were moved off the tracks and used to provide power to residents of Boucherville and Coteau-du-Lac*, south and west of Montreal respectively. A third locomotive was moved to Boucherville, but never actually put to use.[7*]”

Larry/ tree68 no doubt has memories of this event . . . [:-^]

  • Paul North.
6

A few locomotive leasing company’s made out like thieves during the ENRON crisis in California a few years ago . I know of one gentleman that bought a fleet of Amtrak F-40PH engines for that purpose.

7

Couldn’t remember all the details other than it was in Canada, the locomotive was use to power a hospital…now that you mention it, they did run it on the pavement sans track, it was panel track they put down to get it back on the rails?

Anyway, looks like you got a bunch of informative replies and leads…

[quote user=“Rails West”]

Ok thanks, Ed. Thanks to your hints, I found it. It was in Trains April 1998, page 18.

The story was discussed in this previous thread: Locomotives as emergency portable generators?

Interesting thing was that they ran the locomotive down a paved street under its own power. No panel track… wow.

Quoted post from previous thread:

williamsb replied on 06-27-2007 10:32 PM

I knew I kept all these magazines for a reason. The news article is in Trains April 1998 page 18.CN MLW M420W 3502 was derailed in the Montreal suburb of Boucherville and moved under its own power 400 feet down the middle of a paved street to serve as a portable generator for the town’s civic buildings.

There was a huge ice storm that knocked out the power to 1.35 million customers taking in all of southwest Quebec, plus some adjoining areas of Ontario, New York state and Vermont in January 1998. It took several weeks to get all the power back. Our daughter and her family servived that storm in Ontario.

CN 3508 was going to provide power at a high school turned shelter, but only made it as far as the 3502. Two other locomotives remained on the rails and provided power in the Quebec towns of Richelieu and Coteau.

CP provided SD40 5417 and a c

8

Thank You.

9

Holy interesting subject, Batman!

Should something like this happen today (or some other calamity, fill in the blank…) just how much could a loco power? Would you want to stick to DC or an AC loco? What would something like a GEVO or an ACe provide?

10

Regarding question by CNW6000 on how much a loco can power:

In this previous thread,

http://cs.trains.com/TRCCS/forums/t/99035.aspx?PageIndex=1

there was this interesting post (below) by oltmannd that discusses wiring up an SD-40-2. You asked about newer locos, I realize. Possibly there are similar instructions for newer locos?

Begin Quote:

Re: Locomotives as emergency portable generators?

oltmannd replied on 06-28-2007 6:01 AM

Conrail actually had a set of standing instructions on how to provide quasi-commercial power from a locomotive. For an SD40-2, you attach to the bus before the diodes. Operating in notch 6 runs the generator at 647 RPM. Since the AR10 is a 10 pole machine, that gives 64.7 Hz power. You could tweak the governor to get it closer to 60 Hz if you really wanted to, but for powering everything but clocks, it’s close enough. I think the method for regulating the voltage was to disconnect the load regulator from it’s governor-powered vane motor and dialing the voltage in manually. The output is 3 phase power. Max output in notch 6 is about 1000KW. If the avg home draws 2-3 KW on the avg, that’d power several hundred homes.

11

Great, thanks. I’ll play around with some numbers.

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1000KW = 1 MegaWatt (1 MW); since 0.746 KW = 1 HP, that’s about 1,350 HP, only about 45% of an SD40-2’s max. rated power output.

60 amps - may be ‘typical’, not for limited emergency use - for a home on 120 volts is about 7,200 watts or 7.2KW, so that 1 MW could power about 140 homes at that rate. I’ve sometimes seen electric companies equate 1 MW to 100 homes, so there’s another rough correlation/ comparison.

  • Paul North.
13

I seem to remember we had to change the GV module to keep the voltage stable and under 500 volts. There was some other adjustments we had to make to the feedback panels also since we couldnt use the voltage feedbacks from the DC side… I got the drawings and instructions someplace around here…

Randy

14

An EMD 645-E4 is rated at 2000 KW as in the 2 units as emergency generators at the Bronx VA hospital. They of course, are driving 8 pole alternators at 900 rpm. The voltage on that size unit is 4160 VAC. I think the Con Ed feed to the hospital is at 4160V an the hospital steps it down. It seems to me that after the electrical problems of the sixties most hospitals finally decided to get emergency diesel generators, besides they can get on line in 10 seconds. Most of the CAT, and Cummins and Detroit Diesel distributors have rental units mounted in highway trailers of the proper voltage and switch-gear so that they can be connected up rapidly. The difference is now they all have medium speed (1800 rpm) diesel of high enough power density to make it worth while.

15

Saw many of those units in downtown New Orleans the months just after Katrina. Also many portable A/C units blowing drying air into buildings.

Wonder if current A/C traction locos could put out full HP using their inverters?

16

Most likely yes - assuming that there was an option for providing a fixed voltage and frequency to a varying load in the inverter control software. I remember the F69 prototype had three inverters - one being dedicated to HEP, which allowed it to provide correct frequency from run 4 to run 8.

  • Erik
17

Found a pic of CN3508 sitting on the street in the loco section of the CN historical society website:

It’s the one that ended up not being used. It said that 3502 and 3508 both sustained damage from the move.

Here’s 3502 being rerailed:

18

Simply fantastic, thanks for sharing.

19

I realize this is an old thread but I’ll reply anyway. Not only has this been done but it is still done. I recently started working as a Machinist in the UP North Platte Diesel Shop and recently learned that during power outages UP provides locomotives to small nearby towns like Hershey and Sutherland for emergency power and during planned outages. Apparently one unit can run a small town with ease.

20

Thanks. I’ve been telling a few people about the 1998 instances recently, and it’s good to know that it can - and is - still being done when needed.

  • Paul North.