Hear About Rail Vehicle Technology from HDR’s Marcin Taraszkiewicz on DePaul’s Economics & Strategy Podcast

HDR’s Rail and Vehicle Technology Lead, Marcin Taraszkiewicz, recently appeared on the DePaul University Economics & Strategy Podcast to explain the challenges and opportunities with rail vehicles in today’s market.

In the first of a two-part series, Taraszkiewicz shared with host Rich Mullen how his career led him to be one of the foremost industry experts in new rail vehicle technology. In the second part, the two discussed how rail operators can implement battery and other new technologies.

“There is really a lot of pressure on the freight railroads, even though they’re incredibly efficient already,” he noted.

He explained why rail operators can’t simply convert their diesel vehicles to battery operated trains: “When you start looking at batteries, for the equivalent amount of energy for a battery, you’d need 10 times the amount of weight of battery to have the same amount of energy as that diesel fuel you have. You realize when you start stacking batteries in a rail vehicle, very quickly they become so heavy that you can’t physically carry those batteries.”

Learn more about the podcast on the DePaul website. The podcast is available on several podcast player apps.