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| Company to test first fuel-cell trains |
| News Archive - Environmental, New & Alternative Energy - April news | |
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East Japan Railway Corporation (JR East) will complete the world's first fuel-cell-powered trains and conduct a test run in July, the company said yesterday. The fuel cells, which generate power from a chemical reaction between hydrogen and oxygen, will help reduce environmental pollution compared to the existing electric and diesel engines, the company said. The new power source will also help improve scenery when Japan's web of railroads drops electric-power lines. The fuel-cell trains will maintain the same current speed at about 100 kilometres per hour, but the railway company is still developing a system capable of long-distance travel. The technology is expected be ready for use in Nagano and Yamanashi Prefectures, a mountainous region that lies just to the west of Tokyo, by the summer of 2007. JR East, the largest of six passenger railway companies established after the division of Japanese National Railways (JNR) in 1987, operates in the upper half of Honshu, the main island of Japan, including the Tokyo metropolitan area. |
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