Moving by tube

When the chief executive of DP World says “I believe in the Hyperloop. I believe it’s the future,” it begins to sound like prophecy. But how much of the hyperloop is hyperbole?

The idea, initially brought to public attention by Elon Musk’s SpaceX back in August 2013, is simple at its core. When it comes to speed, drag is the enemy: get rid of that by lowering the pressure inside a tube and a capsule could shoot along it at an incredible velocity – potentially up to 760mph (1,200km/h).

Since the biggest revenue stream will be from passenger tickets the extreme engineering is giving rise to both breathy gasps of amazement and horror stories.

Not without rhetorical flair, some critics are calling it “space travel in a gun-barrel”. Concerns have been raised about everything from temperature buckling the track to the appalling result of breaches in either tube or pod and ‘cascading failure’ issues: a single Hyperloop capsule impact will wipe out others behind. There’s also been disquiet about evacuation – would reaching stranded passengers need the capsule and tube to be dismantled? And what kind of state would they be in when the rescue teams got there?

So, although the first proposal was for a link between San Francisco and Los Angeles – and it’s been followed by others such as Stockholm to Helsinki, Basel to Zürich, Moscow to China and Bratislava to Vienna and Budapest – a cargo-only system would soften the safety concerns and give the new technology a crucial foothold.

That, in itself, might give existing supply chains pause for thought but according to Hyperloop Transport Technologies (Hyperloop TT) chair Bibop Gresta, “it doesn’t have to scare anyone”. Ports in particular have more to gain than they might think.

Need for speed

“I have to be frank about long distance freight: it’s very interesting but prices are down. When we analysed the industry we immediately realised that speed is only a concern for around 15% of the cargo.” Therefore he adds it’s really only the very high-value, just-in-time market and reefer trade that would benefit from shifting to hyperloop transportation.

However, he’s clear the technology has a lot to offer: “Many ports have got themselves into a developmental cul-de-sac – one that we can help them out of. Right now a lot of ports are struggling with their business model, you often find high value land being clogged up with cheap goods.” He says it’s a situation made worse by larger corporations “using the facility as subsidised warehousing”.

“So, we have to solve the problem of getting these containers out to somewhere that’s far less valuable, as quickly as possible.” And there’s the rub: the “less valuable” space is often some way off. However, if an inland depot or freight station could be accessed – in both directions – within just few minutes, then a facility’s footprint could be freed up from the usual constraints of physical distance.

According to Mr Gresta, a short-distance hyperloop could whisk the containers “right off the quay”. He adds: “We could help ports reinvent themselves… you could move the main body of the operation into another place entirely – further inland or even out to sea.”

Importantly, he says the hyperloop “is being designed to be fully intermodal… standard 20ft or 40ft containers will be moved in and out of the capsules using the same kind of handling equipment that’s already in use”.

Baby steps

The first steps are already being taken. While Mr Gresta doesn’t say if he’s disappointed or vindicated by DP World’s venture with rival Hyperloop One, the fact is that the recently announced plan may be the first commercial hyperloop off the blocks – shuffling boxes between Jebel Ali and an inland freight station some 29km away. Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem, DP World’s chief executive and group chairman, said: “This is about testing in real terms how much it costs and how much we can save because if it works in Dubai, we will do it in Africa, India and across Asia.” Despite this, Hyperloop TT also has a number of current studies underway and so much is still on the drawing board that there’s really still no guarantee who will be first.

There is another consideration: if a commercial, long distance hyperloop lands close to a port, nearby land prices stand to skyrocket and it may be that Mr Gresta’s ‘remote yard’ solution is needed more than ever.

Of course, if it really turns out to be as cost-effective as hoped, the sky’s the limit: it may even help city ports move out of town and completely change the nature of ‘gateway’ traffic.

The figures have been debated ever since SpaceX claimed the 380-mile Los Angeles to San Francisco loop would only take around $7.5bn for a 3.3m diameter freight and passenger system – a budget hotly disputed by transport analysts. More recently, Hyperloop One proposed $21bn for the 310 mile stretch from Helsinki to Scandinavia, putting all-in costs at something just over $64m per mile – but this included tunnelling under the Aland archipelago.

And Hyperloop TT’s evaluation is only $20m-$40m per mile despite magnetic levitation rather than air cushion supporting it. Naturally it depends on conditions: a tube is more likely to go through, rather than around mountains – and of course there’s the wildcard of land acquisition and, let’s face it, associated legal challenges.

The fact is, nobody can be certain: even established tech like high-speed rail projects increase, on average, by 45% and some even double between contract and build.

Further, calling it ‘cheap’ is misleading. While it appears to be a fraction of the price of a high-speed rail link Mr Gresta points out it is still at least three times as much as an old-fashioned diesel track. He points out a commercial hyperloop’s worth depends entirely on its economic setting: “After all, if you evaluate transport at cost-per-mile and not on efficiency, then you’ll probably end up with what I call the ‘war of the poor’ where the only important thing is how cheap the goods are to move.”

But once up, it could prove a real bargain: a mixture of photovoltaics, wind, kinetic, braking energy recuperation and even geothermal installations “will help us produce up to 30% more electricity than we consume” says Mr Gresta.

SOLVING THE LAST MILE PUZZLE

Any hyperloop design is going to be more like an aeroplane than a bus ride in that it will be point-to-point travel – and getting to the gate will still be an issue.

As Karen Harris of consultant Bain & Company explains: “It’s not just the trunk line or mega hub-to-mega hub link that’s the problem. The last mile connections will be the major challenge for delivery.”

There is a growing list of household names already trying out innovative last-mile answers: “Several companies, including Walmart, Amazon and UPS are experimenting with drones,” she says. It’s catching on: trials have taken place delivering medical supplies to islands, mountains and – in China – marshy, watery provinces. The idea is that if drones can fly over clifftops, the same could apply to our congested urban landscapes.

While drones have load limitations, road droids are the logical offspring of driverless cars and AGVs. However, Ms Harris says the efficient answer lies in blending a combination of technologies; smaller autonomous vehicles operating out of a truck that skirts an urban area, for example. And of course, if they’re close enough, local ports could even have their own drone/droid logistics centres, cutting out the middleman entirely for city deliveries.

It’s worth noting that sheer cost savings will speed up its arrival: according to Ms Harris by 2020, 1 hour drone delivery could be one eighth of the cost of human delivery.

Although all this stretches the imagination, a number of apparently diverse trends could come together to change the world as we know it.

As Ms Harris explains, digitalisation means “you can design your Nike trainers over the web through NikeID, something unimaginable ten years ago”. It’s significant because the ability to automate factories and respond to individual requests could well bring production back to the advanced economies.

“Automation means that manufacturing may no longer be located for cheap mass labour. And if you are looking at smaller, more individual production runs, you don’t need massive plants and it then makes more sense to locate them nearer to the end users.”

She adds: “While energy and raw materials are a different story, we could see far fewer finished goods moving internationally.”