Maglev Freight Solutions

Having undergone more than 10 years of full-scale testing using simulated payloads representing that of full-sized oceangoing containers, AMT technology is well suited for developing a conveyor network of zero-emission freight operations. Maglev operates with an electrical requirement that is 60% lower than that of a conventional vehicle with a diesel engine and steel wheels. 

Linear Induction Motors (“LIMs”), which are currently in commercial operation in passenger-carrying systems in the United States and abroad, are characterized by low cost, high efficiency and low weight. As the system moves, the LIMs generate powerful eddy currents that push the vehicle along the guideway. Once the shuttle reaches its destination and begins to decelerate, the LIMs provide normal braking with energy regeneration, recapturing up to 53% of the vehicle’s kinetic energy. This energy is stored in batteries trackside and used for future departures, resulting in unprecedented energy savings.

This technology is the first of its kind, capable of dropping off and picking up containers at rail hubs, transloading warehouse clusters, and inland depot, freeway and warehouse nodes for connection to out-of-region truck services. The system is designed to handle all port containers (20, 40 and 45-foot), 53-foot domestic containers, as well as specialized transloading containers and activities. The system will be 100% automated, using a communications-based system of train control that is computer-controlled and hardwired on each vehicle.

The strategy would be to utilize this low-cost, energy-saving technology to connect port terminals with activity nodes at freeways, rail yards and warehouse and transloading centers, with a further concentration on the dray trucking business. Maglev freight would become the preferred replacement for the diesel dray trucks in favor of “last-mile” electric trucks that make deliveries from the inland nodes to the container destinations along the arterial roads and off the freeways. These shuttles can be an enabling force for electric trucks, making them more feasible for last-mile deliveries.

AMT is working to deploy this strategy in a proposed commercial demonstration project at the Port of Long Beach (“POLB”). In an unsolicited proposal submitted by AMT subsidiary EMMI Logistics Solutions in 2018, the company proposed the private-sector development of a zero-emission container movement system connecting the Intermodal Container Transfer Facility (“ICTF”) with piers A & C, along with the establishment of an inland port site adjacent to the ICTF.

EMMI seeks to partner with the POLB in this first step of creating a global zero-emission container movement industry based in Long Beach. Contact us for more information about how to become a part of this game-changing initiative.