Surely, Sir Gumboots, you will concede that since it is a game, there is some wiggle room allowed on the realism.Gumboots wrote:If you want to run maglev, you need to generate the power to levitate the train, all of it, as well as push it forward. Trains have very low rolling resistance per ton, so maglev is not always going to be a better solution. You're falling into the trap of "Oooo, teh future! Must be all magical n stuff!"Just Crazy Jim wrote:The fact it is diesel also bothers me. In 2003, there were already maglev trains in operation and the principle of maglev trains has been around since the 1910s. So why not electric at the very least? Granted, the Catenary/OHLE system used in the game is a bit out of step with 3rd rail electrics, which is what most RW maglev systems have used.
It's the future, Gene Roddenberry told us it would be all magical n stuff. Gene would never lie to us....
For this particular instance (Greening Greenland), I am somewhat taken with a line from one of the college kid's dystopian novels I found after he moved out:Depends how you get your fuel. There are various ways of making biodiesel. Or you can run them on gas, which can be made from garbage dumps.But still, diesel? In the scenario that introduces the DD 080-X, they establish that they know about global warming, and whether you agree with it or not, it does not follow that if you start a scenario saying greenhouse gases have wrecked the planet that you then use a diesel locomotive to try to "fix" anything. That's running your argument the wrong way.
But, seriously, if you look back at 2003, there wasn't an especially strong biodiesel movement within the railroad industry. If they were looking at anything with seriousness, it was LNG. Even now, biodiesel use in railroads (in the USA at least) is more a publicity stunt than anything. Much the same way that electric companies offer you the ability to pay more for green energy is something of a scam or publicity stunt (depends on how you look at it), since they over-sell the amount of green energy available by a factor of about 8:1. Pretty much the same business model with cable companies selling "blazing speed broadband".Question: How do you power all this?
Answer: By burning whales in our power plants.
