KAZAKHSTAN: Freight operator SilkWay Transit has ordered 22 twin-section 2ES7 Black Granite electric locomotives from Sinara Transport Machines’ Ural Locomotives plant.
The 8·8 MW locomotives with asynchronous traction motors are designed to haul heavy freight trains of up to 9 000 tonnes on AC electrified lines in the 1 520 mm gauge region.
Deliveries are due to begin at the end of 2021 and run for nine months, with the programme including 3 000 km of trial running in Kazakhstan.
Announcing the order on October 18, STM said it has supplied a total of 46 TEM7A, TEM9 and TEM14 diesel locomotives, 80 track maintenance units and 246 hopper wagons to Kazakhstan since 2007, including four TEM14 shunting locomotives which were handed over to SilkwayTransit this June.
‘STM Holding is aiming for a long-term presence in the railway sector of Kazakhstan’, said General Director Anton Zubikhin. ‘The contract has become one of the largest export projects in the history of our company. The agreement opens up new opportunities, and now we are negotiating the provision of maintenance services for the locomotives.’
Zubikhin said ‘in the past 10 years, the rail freight business has changed significantly: we can see a west-to-east reorientation. Powerful and efficient 2ES7 electric locomotives are an effective way to realise of the potential of the infrastructure for meeting freight transport needs.’
