Theory and Practice of China's Railway Electrification in the 'Belt and Road'

摘要

Since the first operation of electric railway in 1961, the selection of China railway electrification system standard has been proven to be a correct and advanced foundation in decades. The energy-saving and cost effective system has generated significant economic and social benefits for China. In addition, it meets China's high speed and heavy traction power requirements as well. During the "belt and road" practice, strict requirements for system compatibility as well as interconnection (interoperability) have been established in almost each country. As it has been experienced before in Europe, interoperability is the most difficult part to achieve a reliable and robust railway between adjacent countries; therefore, the TSI standards have been developed in Europe to consolidate the rules that has impeded interoperability. Comparatively, China's railway electrification system has chosen the right technical route, thus enjoys obvious advanced benefits, with great adaptability to be implemented in various climatic conditions and possibility of adopting higher target speeds. Similar with electrical power system, the same international ground rules and design methods are applied in electrification system. Plenty experiences accumulated in a number of projects that deal with a variety of landforms and climatic conditions prove that China's electrification standards are mature enough to be employed in the "belt and road." CREEC has started overseas railway projects 10 years ago; especially, the design of high-speed railway projects in Russia and Iran has been started recently. With reference to the history of China's electric railway standards establishment, and analysis on overseas railway electrification projects that we've accomplished in the past 10 years, this article summarizes railway electrification experiences during the "belt and road" practice, and theoretically establishes China's leading position in the "belt and road," providing reference for future projects in terms of railway designing and trouble-shooting.