Summary：China will develop faster and smarter high-speed trains offering passengers a wide variety of choices.

China will develop faster and smarter high-speed trains offering passengers a wide variety of choices, according to a special plan for the country’s high-speed train technology development during the 12th Five-Year Plan period (2011-2015) recently released by the Ministry of Science and Technology. The country’s high-speed rail development has entered “a second spring” after an “unexpected brake.”

Priority given to technological development

Smarter high-speed trains

The special plan noted that during the 12th Five-Year Plan period, the country will make efforts to improve the safety of high-speed railways, develop a wide variety of intelligent and energy-efficient high-speed trains, ensure the sustainable development of high-speed rail technologies, and master the key technologies for high-speed trains and related equipment.

Intelligent technology will allow trains’ monitoring, speed control, condition determination, and fault detection operations to be conducted digitally, said Ding Rongjun, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and general manager of CSR Zhuzhou Electric Locomotive Research Institute Company.

The top speed of a high-speed test train developed by CSR Corporation recently increased from 500 kilometers per hour to 575 kilometers per hour. “The test train integrates various technologies such as Ethernet and the Internet of Things, and can directly determine specific weather conditions. After it is struck by lightning, the train can automatically adjust its speed and optimize related operations to ensure safety,” said Zhao Xiaogang, chairman of CSR Corporation.

In order to reduce smart trains’ energy consumption, the country will carry out research in new traction drive technology based on permanent magnetic motors, according to the special plan. Ding explained that the new traction drive technology featuring fast energy transmission and low energy losses can reduce trains’ energy consumption by more than 15 percent as there is no physical contact between the transmission movable parts.