AUSTRALIA: Western Australia rail infrastructure concessionaire Arc Infrastructure and US technology partner Parallel Systems have unveiled a prototype autonomous container wagon following three years of development.
The battery-powered wagon branded Hiivr Rail was demonstrated to government and industry stakeholders at the Kenwick Freight Rail Facility in Perth on December 7.
Main line trials and integration with Arc Infrastructure’s train control systems are planned for 2024.
The wagon is designed to move containers directly from a port to a network of intermodal terminals where they would be available to customers within hours of being unloaded from the ship.
It is envisaged that this would enable intermodal terminals to be developed on small sites. The number of lorries on the roads would be reduced, and the wagons could be recharged using renewable energy.
Brookfield Infrastructure Partners company Arc Infrastructure has proposed that the wagons could be used as part of the Western Australia state government’s Westport programme to relocate maritime container trade from Fremantle to a new port at Kwinana in the late 2020s.
‘Westport presents a once in a lifetime opportunity to design a port with capability to support emerging technologies’, said CEO Murray Cook. ‘Hiivr Rail is an exciting new concept that allows us to reimagine the freight supply chain to meet Western Australia’s needs through the 21st century.’
Westport Managing Director Patrick Seares said ‘our Landside Logistics Opportunity Study from 2022 identified the autonomous wagon concept as a potential future innovation. We have now built the modelling tools to test different technologies in the supply chain and will examine autonomous rail wagons as part of the innovation strategy’.
