What is railway electrification for?

Railway electrification means that the substation is located near the railway. It transmits the current from the power plant to the catenary or power supply rail beside the railway through high-voltage transmission lines or cables. Catenary or power supply rail is an electrical device that directly transmits electric energy to electric locomotive, and electric locomotive obtains the required electric energy from catenary or power supply rail through pantograph or conductive wheel.

Electrified railway refers to the railway that can be operated by electric trains, so it is named because it needs corresponding electrification equipment to provide power guarantee for trains along the railway. Electrified railway appears with the appearance of electric locomotive, because electric locomotive itself does not have its own energy, and the power supply system along the railway needs to continuously deliver electric energy for it to drive the vehicle.

Because electric locomotives have stronger transport capacity advantages than diesel locomotives, the transport capacity of electrified railways far exceeds that of non-electrified railways of the same scale and becomes the mainstream type of modern railways.

Extended data

Different from the traditional railway with steam locomotive or diesel locomotive pulling the train, electrified railway refers to the railway that obtains electric energy from external power supply and traction power supply system and pulls the train through electric locomotive.

It includes electric locomotive, locomotive facilities, traction power supply system, various electrical devices and corresponding railway communication and signal equipment.

Electrified railway has the advantages of large transport capacity, fast running speed, low energy consumption, low operating cost and good working conditions. It has obvious advantages in technology and economy to realize electrification of trunk railways with large volume and mountainous trunk railways with large slopes and long tunnels.

Overhead cables are connected to the power supply network of electrified railways, which can be divided into two categories: flexible and rigid. The electric locomotive or EMU is connected with the catenary through overhead pantograph and obtains power from the catenary.

Overhead cable and overhead cable are the sayings in Hong Kong and Taiwan, and they are usually called catenary power supply in Chinese mainland. In Chinese mainland, overhead cables and overhead cables generally refer to high-voltage transmission lines.

These two kinds of wires eventually form a loop through the grounding of the normal running track of the train. There are also a few railways that use the fourth track (such as the London Underground) as the current loop.

One advantage of overhead cables is that they can be used as high-voltage transmission lines at the same time, such as the Jingji line in Japan.

Baidu encyclopedia-railway electrification