Neumünster, in the Northern German State of Schleswig-Holstein, will host the Ninth International Hydrail Conference ("9IHC") on 16-18 June this year (2014). This year's registration details, presenters and agenda information appear on the Appalachian State University hydrail web site, https://hydrail.appstate.edu/.
German support for the Hydrail Conference has proved so strong that, for the first time, no registration charge has been necessary.
This blog takes look at what the originators of the International Hydrail Conferences set out to accomplish back in 2005 and offers a brief review of how we've done so far.
It's been almost ten years since the University of North Carolina's Boone Campus (Appalachian State University) first joined with the Mooresville South Iredell Chamber of Commerce to bring world pioneers in hydrogen fuel cell hybrid railway traction technology together in order to expedite development of the technology. Our goals were to help diminish air pollution; to enable railway electrification without the exorbitant cost of wayside power; to help railways transition toward renewable, non-carbon traction energy; and to hasten the redirection of capital and other limited resources away from heritage traction technologies and toward the "post-carbon" railway era.
The First International Conference, held in Charlotte NC in 2005, included presentations and reports from just four countries: the USA, Japan, Denmark and Canada. But the hydrail forum idea caught on and—since 2005—Hydrail Conferences have been convened in the USA, Denmark, Spain, Turkey, the UK and Canada. Teams from about twenty countries have made presentations.
Click here to read the full blog written by Stan Thompson.