All Dutch Electric Trains Now Run Entirely on Wind Energy

Travel by train is not only the most comfortable and economical journey but also environment-friendly. Dutch (Netherlands) have been successfully using windmills as the source of mechanical energy to pump water from water bodies, grind grains and for the production of oil since long. Now they have taken it to to the next level where they are using wind power all its electrical trains.

The dutch Railways network started using wind energy generated from turbines of Eneco company from since 2 years ago, when they signed an agreement with Eneco electric company for 10 years. According to the agreement, they have to power all the country's electric trains by wind energy by 2018 but they have achieved the target 1 year before than planned.This can be attributed to various wind farms spread across the country as well as off the coast of Netherlands. The Dutch Railways company is the world’s first railway company that derives 100% of its energy from wind energy.

How wind energy is converted to electrical energy?

Each wind turbines has a wind vane at the top that indicates the direction of wind.so this facilitates turbine to rotate and face the wind. The blades are lightweight and rotate on their axis for maximum resistance.The kinetic energy in the wind currents propels the blades to rotate. These blades are very long and designed to capture the maximum energy. This facilitates the blades to rotate even at low wind speeds.The rotation of the blades spins the shaft.The shaft is connected to a generator.The generator converts kinetic energy into electrical energy.

Electric company Eneco provides wind energy to transport 6,00,000 people per day. The country's electric trains shuttle 5500 trips per day. Those trips use up 1.2 billion kWh energy per year that equals the power that is sufficient for all households in Amsterdam for a year. It is estimated that a windmill running for 1 hour will generate enough power that runs a train for 120 miles.Further Dutch Railway and Eneco are looking for ways to reduce power consumption by 35% by 2020 that enables the trains to run longer distances with minimum usage of energy.

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