The Dutch railway company NS has announced that all its electric passenger trains are powered 100% by wind energy. This strategy was launched in 2015, when NS became the business partner of the power company Eneco. The aim of this partnership was that the electric passenger trains will be solely supplied with wind power until January 2018, but the project was completed a year ahead of schedule, according to the company representatives.

“Starting with January 1st, the trains are operating with 100% wind energy”, said Ton Boon, spokesman for the Dutch railway company NS. According to him, the realization came faster than the proposed deadline, for 2018.

According to the railway company and Eneco, around 600.000 daily passengers use the railway infrastructure. Also, the estimates made by specialists show that an hour of activity of a wind farm can power a train over a distance of 200 km.

“About 600.000 passengers are given a world premiere, thanks to the agreement valid for 10 years, between the Dutch electric company Eneco and the railway company NS”, said company representatives. Thus, about 5.500 trains in the Netherlands move using wind power.

“The operation of the trains with renewable energy is possible thanks to the numerous wind farms in the Netherlands, Belgium and Finland. This is beneficial for protecting the environment, especially that the rail transports use nearly 1.2 billion kWh of electricity annually”, also stated the NS company officials.