The Birth of the California Locomotive:
Monica Dean and Toby Nicholson. Booze-Allen & Hamilton Inc.

In 1990 California approved two propositions dealing with the funding of clean air and the establishment of rail services to improve air quality in existing and developing commuter and intercity corridors. In response to this legislation, a performance specification for a "clean air" diesel locomotive was developed and proposals were received from General Electric, General Motors and Morrison-Knudsen. A contract for 9 locomotives was awarded to GM in January, 1993. The selected design called the F59PHI included separate HEP, a full width aerodynamic body, computer controlled operation and a 3000 Hp, 12 cylinder main engine with emission engine reduction features. Booze-Allen, under sub contract to Southwest Research Institute, performed emission tests on a GE and GM locomotives to establish gaseous and particulate emissions and smoke opacity and to establish baseline emission levels. The table shown summarizes the results of this work.
    While the 40 retarded timing values are acceptable for present operations, it is anticipated that future improvements can be accomplished with improved charge air cooling, optimized electronic control, LNG fuel and optimization of the HEP engine.

Biodiesel: Craig Chase

A diesel engine will run on anything which can be injected into the cylinder and which will compression ignite. Petroleum diesel #2 fuel oil is the most commonly used fuel in rail applications as a result of its relatively low cost, good energy content and ready availability. Biodiesel fuels formulated from renewable vegetable sources offer an alternative which can be more friendly to the environment in terms of exhaust emissions and spillage into the ground or water table. Some of the more readily available biodiesel fuels are Rapeseed Ethyl Ester (REE), Canola Ethyl Ester (CEE) and Soy Ethyl Ester (SEE), all derived from readily grown plants.
   Of these fuels, REE seems to be the best match to diesel #2 in terms of flow, compression ignition and energy content, the latter being 89% of diesel #2. REE is a favorable match in terms of exhaust emissions, being lower in all measured pollutants except particulates and 2.5% lower overall.
   Costs of biodiesel fuels are not competitive with diesel #2 at present because of the lack of volume production. Increased usage should bring prices down as declining oil stocks raise the cost of petroleum fuels and environmental concerns become more dominant.

May 1996