LA Metro Authority Signs Deal To Install Kinetic Energy Harvesting Technology From Rail Lines
March 4, 2013 Kyriaki (Sandy) Venetis Looking for a solution to yearly increasing energy costs, the LA Metro Authority has signed a $3.6 million deal with the technology company VYCON to design a system for the city’s railways that will capture and store kinetic energy for reuse from train braking systems.
The Metro said in a committee report that it “annually spends approximately $26 million to $29 million for electricity with about $20 million for propulsion power” and for which it faults “the volatile and costly energy market.”
The Metro added that as the years have progressed, it has “seen electricity costs rise due to periodic utility rate increases,” and is now “embracing sustainability, energy efficiency, conservation, and installation of renewable energy sources” as a primary way of gaining control of, and reducing the transit energy usage, costs, and energy dependence.
VYCON designs and manufacturers high-speed energy storage flywheel systems, and plans to install into the transit system a “Wayside Energy Storage Substation (WESS) at the LA Metro Red Line Westlake/MacArthur Park Station” incorporating the company’s REGEN clean energy flywheel system.
To understand it a little better, VYCON explains that the “flywheel-based energy storage systems holds kinetic energy in a spinning mass, and converts this energy to electric power through the use of a high-speed electric motor generator.”
VYCON says that the technology used in the LA transit authority will recycle part of the energy in the system by absorbing and storing kinetic energy generated by braking trains, and returning the stored energy to the trains during acceleration.