It was with great interest that I read an article in Business Day newspaper today about the Gautrain.
There has been much protestation about the highspeed Gautrain that is being built in our province, and the amount of power it will use. People have argued that surely, in times of electricity tightness, a massive power user such as this train would not be good for other consumers.
The Gautrain is planning to use the friction and heat created by braking to generate electricity which it will then feed back into the national grid. The power it will generate from braking will be 20% of the power it uses to accelerate. The energy created will be sufficient electricity to power something as large Eastgate Shopping Centre - that's a fair deal of electricity being pumped back into the national grid.
Good on you Gautrain. We need innovative ideas to help us not only overcome this power crunch, but also to lead us in the direction of becomming a progressive energy-using country in the long-term.
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