When most of North India had a massive power failure due to grid tripping,from Sunday 29th night ,the trains hauled by Electric locos ground to a halt. Many passengers in the trains were stranded on the track due to this...Yet some trains did complete their journey in time...because they were pulled by the Diesel Locomotives..
Diesel under wire really came to the rescue, and subsequently, Diesels were used to pull the stranded trains
Diesel Electric Locomotives have once again proven their Reliability, and usefulness.

^Sir, it is always Diesel engine which can go places unlike Electric which needs some infrastructure in place.

True and India has more Diesel Electric than electric rolling stock. The 95% efficiency of the Electric Loco makes it more appealing than the 40~65 % efficiency of the Diesel..
If the generation,distribution losses and costs are added, then electric Loco is one of the more expensive traction, and Diesel Electric becomes the most efficient,due to it's ability to carry it's own power,which makes it a reliable and versatile form of traction.

The so proposed high speed train projects will still be a dream for an Indian. We are just started to mend roads (read not even good quality relaying) and getting some rooms for 4 lane for National Highways. We will need more more money and Political lobbying for getting these projects green signal. I won't be surprised if the slow paced project were even closed until further notice.

Sad part is what the Govt plans ,...and what actually gets done are different.There is wastage of public money at every step of every stage...lack of Accountability and responsibility is the worm that is eating into most of the projects and No one is ready to Bell the Cat...
High speed trains need total fencing of tracks and no jay walker can cross the track...Imagine a train traveling at 300 kph hitting something on track...and the disaster it will result in....

Miraculous escape from a train accident - YouTube

Due to the North Power Grid collapse 500+ main line trains ,and the Metros have all ground to a halt..of these 200+ have already been cleared by the use of Diesel electric locos, and the rest 300+ are stranded...out of this 120+ are in North Eastern Railway of Mugalsarai, West Bengal,Odisha etc, which are totally electric traction....Efforts are now to restore electricity again after repeated tripping,and /or use Diesel electric locos to clear the traffic.
As per CNN IBN news UP , Haryana are stated to be overdrawing electricity by 26 million units a day, which had lead to the tripping..
Diesel Electric locos are once again proving their worth and reason why they are still in service.

Diesel Power.

I've felt that the point of view that looks at oil fuel as distasteful for the environmental reasons and all, is quite hilarious, alternative fuels and blended fuels could be the future, the plus would be minimal cost to retrofit the engines to run on these fuels.

Hydrogen as a fuel is also immensely viable, but this fuel is still in its infancy, and many obstacles have yet to be crossed for it to be a widely used commercial and reliable source.

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Also Isnt it better to run the high-speed locos on a raised corridor with sufficient space for service and utilities.

That could save on the amount of land needed to be procured albeit might be a bit expensive money wise, but will be a better use of land resource and better safety to both the livestock in and outside the train.

Southern Railway had already taken steps regarding alternate fuels, and for the past 4 years Diesel Locos from Southern sector run on Bio diesel mix....The Bio diesel plant for continuous feeding had been operating successfully, and used Cooking oil from all hotels are collected for this..apart from this Jatropha plants from which bio diesel can be made is grown on a large scale.This had lead to huge fuel savings for the Southern Railway....other sectors are slowly catching up.
Though Hydrogen raises the combustion temperature and thermal efficiency, manufacturing,storing,and using it are problems which must be resolved...
When trains are run on elevated platforms, they have to be supported by huge concrete structures,which itself makes the plan non viable.....I had already mentioned while discussing the TGV, that the Ballast support have to be replaced often due to the fact that the vibration from the high speed train passing over the rail, pounds the large gravel to small pieces, which becomes useless.Over a period of time this vibration will cause structural Integrity failure in the concrete support systems.
China had recently done a cost calculation ,of construction,running, maintenance and recovery of it's metro and had come to the conclusion that it is not viable, and had been a BAD decision to have implemented it....In US also large underground routes of metro have been abandoned,and had become the living and sleeping quarters for the less empowered poor people....
Through the entire world a rethinking is happening on the utilization of fossil fuels ,and trying to find a stable and sustainable alternate fuel.
If water can be used like petrol then there is hope....many theories and experiments and shows of water as fuel are done....but not with sustainable results.

^^^a few guys in india are succesafully running their bikes on water-one i think in maharashtra and other in i guess in gujrat.

Water used like Petrol.. are you refering to HOO gas.. Water gas? They are not high on calorific value though, are they?

Some days back, saw a video of HOO being generated using a plasma arc, it was some brilliant stuff.

It is water gas aided and not pure water run engine..The water is split into Oxygen and Hydrogen by Electrolysis, and it is injected in metered quantity into the combustion chamber to aid better combustion.The electrolysis process consume about 5 amps and this must be supplied by the battery,which must be charged by the Generator in the bike.So power gained in gas injection is equal to power used for charging the battery.
A true water run car was demonstrated in the 1800s in USA,but never took off...the problem is in proving that splitting H2O and using the Brown's gas is actually beneficial....it had not been done so far...
Similarly adding Ethanol in Petrol as a cost effective alternate was used extensively....before they found that engine internals started rusting and wear was more than normal....the cost of repair on engine, more than off set the gain in using Ethanol.
Fog systems which uses heating of petrol/diesel before inlet into carb,or injectors, spraying water along with Air and Fuel into the inlet,Heating water into steam and then injecting it into inlet, using spacers in the inlet manifold between carb., or throttle body,have all come and gone periodically. These "Inventions" appear in cyclical pattern every once in a while.
Here is a link to a list of most of these inventions....

Directory:Fuel Efficiency Retrofits - PESWiki


The final analysis showed that the best FE was attained through judicious use of throttle, rather than these gadgets....

More than the structural failure a Train accident in China on an elevated track had unsettled believers in the system....A Bullet train , rear ended another train on same track,and de-railed on an Elevated platform and the coaches fell to the ground.....deaths were more due to the train coaches falling off the elevated platform than through the accident itself.
Here is the link to the entire account of the incident....

In pictures: east China train crash

Goes to prove our perception of safety, At the risk of sounding Inhumane: the Truth is such accidents can never be a improbability, and such issues should not be the bone of contention for terming a system non feasible.

If the wright brothers would have overly debated the safety issue of powered flight, we would probably not be flying around in our commercial airplanes. (yes: if the wright brothers didnt, maybe someone else would have figured it out later, and the improvements in flight safety and avionics could have taken the same logical pathways, or maybe a different approach, and we would still be flying, but thats besides the point.)

Coudnt the coaches falling off have been prevented by having having a crash buffer, like a gooey run off platform and pneumatically dampened flexible nets (something like those china nets in Kerala, only inverted.) to catch the run off.

and the other part of the problem which i dont think i can comment much on at this juncture, as i need to study that article more to understand the types of control measures and interlinked safety measures of the system.

Yes precisely, but maybe our approach was wrong, instead of using it as a addictive to conventional fuels to get better mileage, we should look at these fuels as a total replacement. When that is realised, we could then identify the type of engine these fuels are more suitable for.

ethanol is unforgiving, scrubs off the oil film over key engine internals, and the steam makes merry love to it.

but it can be used as a fuel for a stirling engine. and with correct utilisation of the products of combustion we can help improve the efficiency of the cycle.. Am just thinking along a tangent here

em and isnt water alcohol injection used in very high compression engines to prevent preignition?

Everything is at a price. The cost & recovery should justify the implementation
Leonardo davinci had concept of flying but was too ahead of his time and his plans never saw the light of day....that said if the Air safety had not improved then people won't be in them..and the fact it saves time and help in getting a job done in time and helps business is the key to it's survival. If trains were to equal flight in operating time, then there will be a major switch to trains by passengers....which is what the Bullet train had achieved in Japan.
Catch a few hundred tons of metal hurling along at 200 kmph ?...(If a 1 ton car were to stop from 40 kmph , the amount of energy spent will be equal to lifting the car 40 feet high...)
In World War II Water+Alchohol Injection was used to cool the piston engine flying at high altitude...at higher altitude air is thin and the piston engine AF mix used to be very lean ,for FE,and engine would turn very hot.further the lack of adequate oxygen also robbed the engine of power..to decrease engine heat the Alchohol+water mix was sprayed which helped in both combustion and cooling..

Then the Nazis came with their " ha ha " fighters...and engines power up changed for ever,...including in motor sports.

not related to locos, but since we're talking about fuel.
HHO Water Fuel Kits for 2 wheelers | eBay

How useful is a product like this? I don't get their technique. Look at the last pic in the attachments of the product given