The Europe’s Rail Joint Undertaking (EU-Rail) invites the European Rail Freight Sector, its Customers and other stakeholders to openly express their interest to be part of the needed phase of large-scale testing of DAC technology (Digital Automatic Coupling for freight trains incl. DAC based applications) in 100 pre-deployment trains according to the DAC General Master Plan.
The foreseen testing in different European regions is intended to prove functionality, reliability, availability, performance and added value of DAC in real-life operation. This request is addressed to the entire European Rail Freight Sector including its customers and is transparently published on the EU-Rail EDDP website for any interested stakeholders to answer.
To gather statistically significant and sufficient information and data to represent European freight traffic, long-term tests with a number of around 100 DAC pre-deployment trains are required.
Potential interested parties for these trains should:
operate as much as possible in commercial operation, maybe supported by special supervision (as potentially not yet fully authorized by the start of operation)
cover multiple European regions and Member States
cover different relevant operational conditions and show a considerable number of shunting operations in production, if possible
reach out to partners and operators who are not yet engaged or involved
address possible support in the form of in-kind activities (e.g. test drivers, shunting yard staff, inspectors, project management, etc.)
start operation around in late 2026 for a duration of 2 years minimum
The received input will also be used to clarify the budget needed for these trains, as funding for the predeployment phase is not secured yet.
There will be an Info session_Letter of expression of interest for pre-deployment trains on 22.02.2024 15.00-16:00 Turkish Time. Meeting will be online on the link.
EU Rail kindly asks you to come back until 15 March 2024 to the coordinating EDDP programme (info-DAC@rail-research.europa.eu) with an expression of interest from your side to operate pre deployment trains.
More information: https://rail-research.europa.eu/news/request-for-expression-of-interest-to-be-part-of-a-possible-large-scale-testing-of-100-dac-pre-deployment-trains-in-europe-2026-2028/
Call document: https://rail-research.europa.eu/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/20240112-EDDP-pre-deploym-trains-website.pdf