21/11/2023 – By Frédéric de Kemmeter – Railway signalling and freelance copywriter – Suscribe my blog
(Version en français)
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Even faster? A major battle is being waged between Japan and China over a railway technology that has been forgotten in Europe: magnetic levitation (Maglev). With the levitation technology, trains run above the tracks, not along them, suspended in the air by magnetic forces. So there is no wear and tear on the rails as there is on conventional railways.
Why a new line after the Shinkansen success?
As described Sven Andersen in the Asia-Pacific Journal, the present timetable for the Tokaido Shinkansen has led to saturation of conventional high-speed lines. The Tokyo-Osaka service includes direct Shinkansen service (Nozomi) as well as others Shinkansen stopping at several intermediate stations, called « Hikari » and « Kodoma ». However, the expansion of traffic requires more ‘Hikari’ and ‘Kodoma’, between which almost 225 direct Shinkansen must squeeze. Today it is no longer possible to insert additional « Hikari » and « Kodoma », nor more Shinkansen in a time grid completely full. This led to the idea of creating a new line that would no longer pass along the coast.
At the same time, the Japanese wanted to make a major technological leap forward and double the commercial speed rather than simply replicating the conventional rail/wheel technology of the current Shinkansen. To achieve this, they adopted magnetic levitation, an invention that originated in Europe.
Maglev
After the September 22, 2006 disaster in Lathen, Germany, Maglev technology came to a definitive stop in Europe, with the exception of Bavarian entrepreneur Bögl, who still believes in it, but in an urban version. On June 30, 2000, the German (Schröder era) and Chinese governments signed an agreement to conduct a joint feasibility study for the Maglev Shanghai, involving the companies Max Bögl, Siemens AG, ThyssenKrupp Transrapid GmbH and Transrapid International GmbH & Co. In 2001, on the basis of the feasibility study, a first draft design for the project was completed, with an agreement on technology transfer. The line between Shangaï and Pudong Airport was inaugurated on December 31, 2002, and remains the only major commercial project to date. This state-owned short-distance maglev has struggled to turn a profit, losing more than 1 billion yuan in its early years. Except these examples, the technology has never been used for an intercity route.
The new japanese Maglev line is a project which will connect the three major metropolitan areas of Tokyo, Nagoya, and Osaka. It is known as Chuo Shinkansen. It will to plan to put Maglev trains at a maximum speed of 505 km/h into operation which will roughly halving current conventional Shinkansen journey times. It is expected to shorten the Tokyo-Nagoya journey from 1 h 30 minutes to 40 minutes, and the Tokyo-Osaka journey from 2 h 30 minutes to 1 h 07 minutes. The project was approved in 2014 and also under the 2017 plan in which the ¥5.52 trillion ($US 50bn) budget was set.
As explains Sven Andersen, a clear separation of the different train types is intended to maximize the overall capacity on both high speed lines in the Tokyo – Osaka corridor: the existing Tokaido Shinkansen will be used exclusively to meet the traffic demands from all intermediate stations to the hub stations in the Tokyo metropolitan area as well as Nagoya, Kyoto and Osaka, whereas the new Chuo Shinkansen will take over all Nozomi services. This step requires assuring the same capacity for the Nozomi trains on the Chuo Shinkansen as is present on the Tokaido Shinkansen.
Major civil works
Of course, driving at 500km/h means that stretches of road have to be as straight as possible. The gradients reach around 40‰, which is already practised on conventional high-speed. The main problem with the Chuo Shinkansen is that as it leaves the coastal areas, it has to fit into an almost mountainous terrain reminiscent of the Alps in Europe.
To reduce noise and solve terrain problems, 86% of the tracks on the Tokyo-Nagoya section are underground, while the open-air section is only 40 kilometers long. Deep underground sections are also used in sections in three major metropolitan areas, including Higashi – Meihan. The two terminal stations are also deep underground: Shinagawa station, at the far end of Tokyo, would be 40 meters underground, and Nagoya station would be buried at around 30 meters. The Chuo Shinkansen turns out to be a huge concrete tube buried deep beneath the mountain.
The trains
Central Railway has so far built 3 prototypes of this train: the MLX01-1, the MLX01-901 and the « Serie 0 ». To date, the L0 series train consist of a 12-car train for test operations over the entire extended section (42.8 kilometers) of the existing Yamanashi experimental line. The letters and numbers « L » and « 0 » are taken from « Linear » and « Zero emission ». The windows have the appearance of aeroplane windows, only slightly larger.
The Chuo Shinkansen dimension is less wide than the conventional Shinkansen in operation. This implies that there is only four seats to a row (2+2 arrangement), compared to the five now in use in Shinkansen trains. This could make the Maglev less profitable, as the width of the conventional Shinkansen was precisely an argument for carrying 1,323 passengers (Serie N700 with 16 cars), without the need for double-decker trains as in France (TGV Duplex). This lower capacity, even with a hoped-for 8 trains per hour, is the subject of controversy in Japan.
It can already be estimated that Maglev requires three times the power of the conventional Shinkansen
The Japan’s Maglev network is based around superconducting magnets that are able to levitate the train by up to 10cm with minimal friction. The energy consumption of a high-speed system is an important part of its total operational costs. But in these times of testing and research, business secrecy means that we can’t put a figure on exactly what magnetic levitation consumes. Partial information can be obtained about the project from other Japanese sources, which, although technically sound, can be mainly attributed to the critics of the Maglev L0 based on the respective arguments. However, it can already be estimated that Maglev requires three times the power of the conventional Shinkansen. According some sources, at peak times, the Chuo Shinkansen line would require 270,000 kW of electricity for a maximum travel speed 1.7 times that of ordinary Shinkansen trains.
Maintenance has not been forgotten. Construction of the first of two Maglev vehicle maintenance facilities for the Chuo Shinkansen began on October 14 2021, at Nakatsugawa City in Gifu prefecture. The 50 ha site is located on a spur to the east of the Tokyo – Nagoya maglev alignment about 65 km from Nagoya.
Apart from inspection and maintenance work, the Nakatsugawa facility will include a workshop for the assembly of new vehicles as well as complete overhauls. The second depot and maintenance site will be located at Sagamihara City in Kanagawa Prefecture, about 45 km from central Tokyo, according Railway Gazette.
On 21 April 2015, the L0 train has reached 603km/h on an experimental track in Yamanashi préfecture.
Exploding costs and delays expected
At the time of Shinzō Abe, the government’s low-interest loan to high-speed rail was one of many goodies in a plan advertised at over ¥28 trillion ($US 280 billion in 2016). But in 2021, JR Central has confirmed an increase in construction costs for the Chuo Shinkansen of ¥1.5 trillion ($US 13.7bn) taking the total cost of the 286km Tokyo – Nagoya project to ¥7.04 trillion ($US 70bn), explains IRJ.
« The maglev constitutes not only an extraordinarily costly but also an abnormally energy-wasting project », explain two researchers
Costs, too, concerning the train itself. Due to the inability to negotiate with Japan’s Tokai Passenger Railway (JR Tokai) over manufacturing costs, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries decided to withdraw from building the train. In December 2018, JR Tokai announced that Nippon Rolling Stock Manufacturing and Hitachi Manufacturing would become the new Maglev manufacturing managers.
The hefty price-tag of Japan’s Chuo Shinkansen has been thrown into question amid the coronavirus pandemic, which surveys predict may permanently alter the need for business travel between major centers.
Railway-technology reported in 2020 the comments from Hidekazu Aoki and Nobuo Kawamiya, two Japanese researchers denouncing the project: “the maglev constitutes not only an extraordinarily costly but also an abnormally energy-wasting project, consuming in operation between four and five times as much power as the Tokaido Shinkansen.”
Central Japan Railway Co. (JR Tokai) initially planned to have the Chuo Shinkansen Line in operation between the capital’s Shinagawa Station and Nagoya Station in 2027, with a later connection to Osaka. But one prefecture, those of Shizuoka, concerned by only 8.9 kilometers of the project, refuses to give the green light to the work. The 2027 date is therefore seriously compromised. Prefectural officials argue that construction of a tunnel will cause groundwater to flow outside the prefecture, resulting in a decrease in the volume of water available in the Oigawa river, which runs through the prefecture, explains the website asahi.com.
A technology for export?
The Detroit News explains that one of the countries that JR Central is looking to export its maglev technology to is the U.S., where it’s working with partners to lay the groundwork for a maglev line that would connect Washington D.C. and New York, costing an estimated $10 billion for the first D.C. to Baltimore leg alone. If constructed, the train would cut travel time between the hubs to one hour from the current three, according to JR Central, making it even faster than flying.
But in order to be convincing, the Japanese, in competition with the Chinese, will have to demonstrate the benefits of Maglev technology and, above all, the cost efficiency of the infrastructure and of the project as a whole.
Europeans have been wiser, continuing to focus on rail/wheel technology. Of course, we also need to give guarantees to this carbon-free transport, and avoid the devastating procrastination we saw recently with HS2 in Great Britain… 🟧
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21/11/2023 – By Frédéric de Kemmeter – Railway signalling and freelance copywriter – Suscribe my blog
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