This video was originally published by Trains as part of the Locomotive 2017 DVD.
Natural gas as a locomotive fuel has been around for decades. Testing in the 1980s and 1990s on several railroads failed to yield the interest and scope of testing the fuel has enjoyed in the past several years. Six of the seven Class One railroads, such as BNSF, and several smaller railroads, have experimented with natural gas recently.
Alongside BNSF, Florida East Coast has become one of the leading railroads in natural gas testing. Its 2014 purchase of 24 General Electric ES44C4 locomotives was a landmark purchase for the company, noteworthy for being the first GE locomotives boughtpurchased and also built with provisions for GEs NextFuel system to use natural gas.
In late 2016, FEC was sending its units back to GE for installation of the NextFuel equipment to expand LNG testing that began in December 2015. The railroad has plans for 12 LNG tenders and permission from the government to operate at this time from Jacksonville to Miami currently.
The railroad operated its first LNG test equipment in December 2015 with a single FEC ES44C4 800), FEC fuel tender and GE’s NextFuel demonstrator ES44AC 3000. General Electric’s demonstrator has continued to test on FEC’s main line along with FEC locomotives.
Testing expanded to trains operating from Jacksonville to New Smyrna Beach early in 2016 with the range extended to the entire main line from Jacksonville to Miami in June of that year. Refueling the LNG tenders takes place at Fortress Investment Group’s (Does Fortress still own this?) Hialeah LNG facility, which is adjacent to FEC’s own Hialeah Yard in Miami. A new facility is proposed for Port Canaveral, and both facilities are owned by Fortress Investment Group, the parent company of the FEC Railwayroad.
As of spring 2017, the railroad had eight LNG fuel tenders in service out of a planned 12. As new tenders continue to arrive, FEC has been sending all 24 of its ES44C4s through GE’s Erie plant for installation of NextFuel equipment with 18 upgraded as of early 2017.
