Alstom Delivers 100th Electric Locomotive of 12,000 HP to Indian Railways

Alstom, country’s biggest multinational sustainable mobility provider, has successfully manufactured and delivered the 100^th electric locomotive to Indian Railways.

As part of the contract worth €3.5 billion won in 2015, the company will be supplying 800 fully electric high-powered double-section locomotives of 12,000 HP (9 MW) for freight service, capable of hauling ~6,000 tonnes at a top speed of 120 km/hr.

This is the largest Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) project in the Indian Railway sector.

Commenting on the milestone, Alain Spohr, Managing Director of Alstom India said, “I’m pleased to mention that despite challenges posed by COVID-19, we have been able to successfully manufacture and deliver 100 e-Locos to the Indian Railways in less than a year. Due to the intricacy of the project, it is really an honour to work on a first-of-its-kind ‘Make in India’ project that resulted in a technology breakthrough for the nation. Our successful collaboration with Indian Railways is paving the way for bringing advanced innovation and technology to the Country. Alstom is committed to delivering safe, reliable, and efficient solutions for IR’s revolutionary journey towards becoming the world's first 100% green railways”.

The Prima T8^TM WAG-12Be-Locos are built at one of India’s largest integrated greenfield manufacturing facilities at Madhepura in Bihar. Spread across 250 acres, this industrial site has been built to international standards of safety and quality. The site has installed production capacity of 120 locomotives per annum and Alstom has progressively achieved over 85% indigenization. With these powerful e-Locos being manufactured within the country, India has become the 6th in the world to join the club of countries producing high horsepower locomotives indigenously.

The project also includes setting up of two ultramodern maintenance depots in Saharanpur in Uttar Pradesh and Nagpur in Maharashtra. These depots are equipped with the latest technologies and features to anticipate breakdowns thereby enabling proactive maintenance of India’s most advanced freight locomotives at significantly lower costs. The depot in Saharanpur is currently operational and houses a ‘Training Centre’ equipped with a loco simulator and smart classrooms for skill development of railway employees and loco pilots. Till date, more than 500 loco pilots from Indian Railways have been trained and going forward, an additional 500 will be trained annually. The Nagpur depot will be functional next year.