Hyperloop One: Transportation of the Future
Getting from one city to another is about to get quicker and easier, if engineers at Hyperloop One have their way.
Traveling close to the speed of sound inside of a tube, which has very low air pressure, a pod filled with people or a shipping container can travel directly from one location to the next without the potential interference of the outside world.
An object traveling inside of a vacuum means that the air pressure is reduced and there is very little resistance on the object. That’s how the ‘Hyperloop’ can travel so fast.
Traveling inside of a tube eliminates any outside elements from changing the amount of time it takes to get from start to finish.
Hyperloop One, which is the name of the company building the ‘Hyperloop’ system, is a privately-held company. It was founded in 2014 by Brogan BamBrogan, Josh Giegel, and Shervin Pishevar.
Elon Musk, the CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, presented a system architecture of the ‘Hyperloop’ to the White House in 2013. The plans seemed very promising and Hyperloop One started with Musk’s basic plans and then added focus on transporting freight along with people. That’s how Hyperloop One was born.
With over $245 million in funding and investors ranging from GE Ventures, Sherpin Capital, and Virgin Group, hopes are high that this concept will become reality in the near future.
Elon Musk is neither an investor nor is he affiliated with Hyperloop One but he shares the same goal of wanting to see the ‘Hyperloop’ become reality.
The founders know that our roads and airways are congested and wanted to create an emissions-free, on-demand, and extremely fast mode of transportation. Their goal is to integrate the new system into the transportation ecosystem without getting in the way of any other ways of travel.
BamBrogan was fired from the company during its beginning phases and went on to create a company called Allevio, which is inspired by the same technology used in the ‘Hyperloop’ system.
The ‘Hyperloop’ pod accelerates gradually through electric propulsion, which is thrust generated by electricity that moves the pod forward.
The pod hovers above rails via Maglev, or magnetic levitation. This is a fancy way to describe something that floats in the air due to magnetic forces pushing on it.
Maglev is most commonly used in train transportation in Europe and Japan. It uses two sets of magnets, one to repel or push the train off of its tracks and another set to move the train forward — hence the term magnetic levitation.
Try to remember the science classes you took in middle school. You learned that magnets have two poles, north and south.
Poles that are the same repel one another while opposite poles attract one another.
The bottom of the train and the tracks have a like attraction causing the train to be pushed away from the tracks.
Concrete walls used as a guide way for the trains have electromagnets built into them with north and south poles next to each other.
The sides of the train have the same north and south pole setup built in. This creates attracting forces that pull and push the train forward, creating the forward movement.
Both concepts work in similar ways in modern day bullet trains.
Dr. Derrick Boucher, professor of physics at Florida Gulf Coast University, explained the feasibility of this new concept.
“The trick with maglev is that in order to have the opposing magnetic fields needed to lift a train into the air, the magnets need to be really heavy. So electromagnets are used, which are much lighter. These can be turned on and off, which creates the potential issue of timing needed to turn the magnets on and off,” said Boucher.
The system is supposed to be fully automated with no pilots or wheels needed, only pre-built tracks and tubes, which reduces the margin for error dramatically.
“The devil is in the details. The concept of the Hyperloop is very feasible. But the factors that go into accommodating this new mode of transportation are very broad and not as simple as one might hope. Emergency management for the Hyperloop will be critical and if a portion of the tube is underground or underwater, this management will be very difficult,”said Boucher.
Effective emergency management will be key to the success of this technology. But as with every new mode of transportation created, intensive testing and retesting will be needed before any person steps inside of a ‘Hyperloop’ pod.
The 21st century is overdue for an innovative, efficient, and clean mode of transportation, considering no new mode of transportation has been invented in over 50 years.
The most recent innovation in transportation was, in fact, the Maglev train, which made its maiden voyage with the general public in 1984, in Birmingham, England.
The ‘Hyperloop’ is set out to be energy-agnostic, which means that power sources will be drawn from any readily available source along its routes.
Whether it is wind or solar, once the system is up and running, it’s theoretically 100% carbon free.
The only emission required is for the civil engineering process to build the entire system. Once it is built, it relies on itself and the natural energy sources to continue running.
Occasional maintenance and repairs might require some emissions but the transportation system itself will be emissions-free.
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