TRIG sensor certified by AAR
TransRail Innovation Group’s (TRIG) XLOAD sensor has been certified by the Association of American Railroads (AAR) to begin pilot trials on rail tank cars shipping hazardous commodities like crude oil and refined fuels.
XLOAD is the first digital sensor to be certified by the AAR to measure and track hazardous commodities inside of moving tank cars. Furthermore, TRIG operates the only digital manufacturing facility of its kind in North America to be certified to the M-1002 and M-1003 standards by the AAR to build this type of sensor technology for use with hazardous commodities inside of moving tank cars.
“The M1002 and M1003 is a quality assurance programme that has been developed by the AAR for the rail industry safety and reliability standards that are set out by the Federal Railroad Association in the U.S. and Transport Canada”, said Kent Duncan, TRIG Quality Assurance Manager. “Companies seeking these approvals must go through a demanding facility audit and be approved by a ballot process that involves the AAR and its industry partners in Mexico, the U.S. and Canada,” he explained.
TRIG has been approved as a C4/C5 facility which allows the company to manufacture sophisticated digital safety and service equipment for tank cars. TRIG has a unique position as one of only a few C4 certified facilities in North America, and the sole facility approved to manufacture digital technology that directly contacts the hazardous commodities inside of moving rail tank cars.
The battery-operated XLOAD’s patented measurement and monitoring technology and wireless data communications helps produce a ‘Safer and Smarter Tank Car’. As an example, it is used by hazardous commodity shippers to automatically detect, measure, and report on the specific levels and volume of crude oil that are loaded into and unloaded out of tank cars. This replaces the inaccurate, inefficient, and risky measurement methods that require operators to open the tank car and manually inspect the levels and volumes of the toxic commodity inside of the tank car.
This poor visibility of the commodity levels inside of tank cars causes the industry to chronically under fill cars by an average of 5%. This is done to avoid the danger of overfilling the tank cars. Shippers can now safely increase those fill levels by leveraging the accuracy of the sensor’s measurements inside of a closed tank car. By eliminating the unused capacity inside of the tank car, shippers benefit by reducing the transportation cost of every litre, gallon, and barrel shipped. And, properly filling tank cars eliminates the danger of under filled and unbalanced rail tank cars. Unbalanced rail tank cars have a greater risk of derailment.
TRIG has begun pilot trials with four refineries and shippers located in Canada and the US.
The sensor’s modern GPS technology pin points the real-time location of where the tank car and its hazardous commodity ‘is’. This is a significant safety advantage over the current industries’ older and slower method that only reports on where a rail car ‘was’ in the previous 24 hours. Shippers benefit by being automatically alerted to the location of their hazardous commodities when close to sensitive areas like cities. And, the sensor automatically alerts them to hazardous commodity leaks and thefts, and other issues.
For more information, visit: www.transrailinnovation.ca
12th Mar 2018
