Batteries are cool PR, but wouldn't it be better for a train to not have to accelerate all the mass of the batteries, and just use wires overhead to deliver power?
I almost bored you with technical details I will refrain, but basically, you want your train to be able to continue if you have a third rail/overhead failure. Look up TGV-M if you want more information.
"just" run high powered wires with enough energy to move an entire train for the entire length of the track? and deal with having a coupling system to the train? obviously since it's been done it's feasible, but I think you're discounting how much work that is to build and maintain.
I'm not sure what's more resilient, if a tree falls on to the tracks breaking the electrified wire, it'd also be on the rails, stopping the train anyway, but I imagine not having an electrified wired dangling around across the country is less dangerous than having a battery in a known location with qualified engineers looking after it.
They could just be doing this for PR purposes, but I'd love to see the internal cost analysis that was done to build this vs the cost of building using a known good solution.
> “just" run high powered wires with enough energy to move an entire train for the entire length of the track?
This has been done successfully around the world since the 1880s. Looking at a map it seems like the length of the line is only a few miles, so doesn’t seem like it would be that huge of an electrification project, especially considering Germany’s rails are already 55% electrified.
