Magnetic levitation train sustainable alternative for short scheduled flights

A magnetic levitation train that shoots through a vacuum tube at 1000 km per hour. It seems an impossible task, but the first prototype will be presented at the end of June by a student team from TU Delft. What started ten years ago as an experimental idea by American entrepreneur and inventor Elon Musk, known for electric cars, is now the full-time job of 38 technical students in Delft. Since the summer of 2021, they have been working on a prototype of the magnetic levitation train, the Helios I, which has all the technologies of a full-fledged hyperloop.

FHI spoke with Hidde de Bos, Chief Engineer of the hyperloop team and plenary speaker during the Power Electronics & Energy Storage event on June 14 in Den Bosch. De Bos studies Applied Physics and Mathematics in Delft and is now having a gap year in which he and 37 peers work until the late evening hours on the Helios I. It is a race against time, because since Musk first presented his hyperloop plans, dozens of companies and institutions ran away with the idea. They all want to become the Wright brothers of the magnetic levitation train, but De Bos and his team are hopeful that TU Delft will soon take the honors. 

Technology behind the hyperloop

And that would be quite an achievement, because the team of volunteers is competing against students and commercial parties from all over the world. “We start with nothing at the beginning of the year. We are literally standing in an empty room. Then we start brainstorming, designing, building and at the end of the year there will be a working hyperloop that is ready to participate in competitions,” De Bos explains proudly. “We are the first student team to use active levitation. We place permanent magnets on the vehicle that create a fixed magnetic field. We then attach copper coils to the track. If you apply current to them, the coils also create magnetic fields that, as it were, push the permanent magnetic fields away. This causes the vehicle to float and start moving.”

Alternative to airplane

“The big advantage of active levitation is that you have more influence and therefore control over your control system. This opens up possibilities in the future high speed lane switching, where the driver can change lanes at high speed,” says De Bos. “You can imagine that it is not easy to change lanes with a vehicle that goes ten times as fast as a train, but this is possible with active levitation technology.”

The prototype does not yet reach the theoretical speed of 1000 kilometers per hour, which Musk fantasized about ten years ago. But in 20 years it should be possible to 'float' with passengers from Amsterdam to Paris within half an hour. This makes the hyperloop a serious competitor for the airplane. De Bos: “That is our ultimate goal. We want short and medium scheduled flights to no longer take place. These flights are extremely polluting to the environment and the hyperloop is the perfect sustainable alternative.”

Scalability  

After just a year of designing, developing and building, the hyperloop team has already entered the testing phase. “We now have a fully functioning scale model of two meters long. We can test the model in the vacuum tubes of Hardt Hyperloop, which is a commercial company and a spin-off of one of the first hyperloop teams at TU Delft. I have every confidence in the technology we use, but we also have to work on scalability. It must be feasible for companies to design the infrastructure in such a way that the hyperloop can be deployed on a large scale. That is why, in addition to a team of engineers, we have a team that focuses entirely on scalability and security. They design the stations and determine how much power is needed for a hyperloop ride.

They also look at the location of the vacuum tubes. You can place them above or below ground and each option has pros, cons and costs. There is now a concrete plan to attach the pipes above the existing Amsterdam Zuid station. A station above a station. That will look fantastic. It's another challenge design of the vacuum tubes. Not all materials can withstand the enormous pressure of magnetic fields. So you are limited in your choice of materials, but you do want the pipes to look attractive - especially if they are placed above ground. In short: before the hyperloop can enter the market, many hurdles still have to be overcome,” says De Bos.

Convince

The team also thinks about safety aspects and there is now a comprehensive safety plan in which all possible risks are discussed. “Ultimately, we have to convince not only large transport companies, but also the government of the feasibility and benefits of this new means of transport. If we want to deploy hyperloops on a large scale, the law must be amended,” says De Bos. “Just think of the enormous impact that the vacuum tubes will have on the landscape and the costs associated with the construction of a hyperloop network. These are all aspects that will soon play an important role in national decision-making regarding the hyperloop as a means of transport.”

Durable

De Bos and his teammates expect that in twenty years hyperloops will no longer be an indispensable part of the landscape. And not only in the Netherlands, but worldwide. “The use of hyperloops has enormous benefits for society. They are energy efficient, emission-free and easily scalable. In principle, you can lay the pipes indefinitely over land and even underground. There will come a time when the hyperloop will be as normal as the car or the train.”

Hidde de Bos will preach on June 14 during the Power Electronics & Energy Storage event in Den Bosch. Register now for this event for free via: https://fhi.nl/energystorage/.