Transportation Innovations, Essay Example

Transportation has a very considerable weight in the framework of sustainable development by environmental pressures, the social and economic effects associated and interrelationships with other sectors. The continuous growth that has been undergoing this sector over the past few years and its foreseeable increase makes the challenge of achieving a sustainable transport is a strategic priority to local, national, and worldwide populations.

During the past few years, the transportation sector has experienced a strong evolution thanks to the development of new technologies and solutions such as the ‘smartphones’ that are enabling you to make payments on the public transport easily and increasingly secure.

Xerox, which provides systems and services for intelligent transport and simple, which includes the collection of tickets, photographic control, solutions for tolls, fleet management, etc, has identified four major trends that are driving innovation in the transportation industry, such as urbanization, demographic changes, new business models and innovation.

Each time more people will live in cities and there will be a larger number of cities that exceed ten million inhabitants, which puts the accent on the current transport infrastructure. For this reason, governments will continue looking for ways to use the data of viable ways to improve the services offered to residents of the city, reinforcing the smart cities.

The ‘millennials’, those born between 1980 and 1992, which is expected to soon will account for 50% or more of the urban labor force, looking for liveable cities and more resources to improve mobility in the same. In fact, recent research shows that they want to use their mobile devices to make immediate decisions on their mobility. Therefore, attract and retain these citizens make cities more competitive.

New business models are emerging new forms to meet the current needs of mobility. For example, mobile applications and the implementation of private companies are providing services directly to mobile users without the need for these are tied to the urban entities that normally be responsible for managing the public transport.

Technology innovation is increasingly used to eliminate any challenge and reduce to ‘zero’ aspects such as the breach of the rules, the accidents, deaths, the emissions that harm the environment, etc. The development of automated vehicles connected and is an example of this trend, because the main objective is the reduction of traffic accidents and deaths.

One of the common aspects of all these trends is the use of the data to the mobility agents make better use of existing devices, meet the changing needs of users and reduce the congestion and the impact on the environment.

There are a few ways that I would innovate in global transportation systems. It is important to note that many of the global transportation systems which are already in existence are excellent transportation systems. However, they simply could use some adjustments to make global transportation easier for the general public. My Idea of transportation innovation is an advanced train or subway system that travels at high velocities. This is similar to Elon Musk’s “Hyperloop” concept.

The Hyperloop is a means of high-speed transport hypothetical, proposed by Elon Musk, inventor and founder of SpaceX. Musk sees the system as a “fifth” of transport, an alternative to the ships, planes, cars and trains. This system could be able to travel from the center of the city of Los Angeles to the city center of San Francisco in less than 35 minutes3 that is to say, 563 km (350 miles) to more than 1,100 km/h (685 mph).

Musk compared the system with a Concorde land and with a cross between a Concorde and a canon of rail, while pointing out that I did not need rails. Musk felt that the Cost of the Hyperloop between San Francisco and Los Angeles would be approximately six billion dollars, a thirtieth of the cost of high-speed train in California that has been proposed to give service between both cities. Musk has revealed that the Hyperloop is not a train that travels through a tube where it made the vacuum.

Hyperloop is a new mode of transport that seeks to change the current paradigm to be fast and cheap for people and goods. Hyperloop is a concept of open design, similar to Linux, in which the contributions of the community can advance the design and make it a reality. It is a system that is fast, cheap, with exits to the almost immediate and sustainable traveler ambient. It consists of a tube that contains air at low pressure by the capsules that are circulating on a cushion of air. The nose of the capsule contains an electric compressor that transfers high pressure air from the nose to the tail of the capsule. The compressor provides levitation and to a lesser extent propulsion.

To accelerate the capsule up to subsonic speeds are used an external linear electric motor. It is like an electric motor cylinder but unrolled and flattened. It also provides periodic pulse every 113 km. This engine is installed in only 1% of the length of the train, so it is not particularly expensive. The linear rotor is located inside the capsule. Capsules and electric motors are the least expensive part of the project. Most of the cost is the construction of the tube.

The propulsion system includes 2500 kg of batteries, the compressor, refrigerant and other electronic components. The cost of these components would be less than 150,000 USD for the simple capsule and 200,000 USD for the large. So not only does this concept of transportation create advancements in transit technology, it is also cost effective to the global economy. This is important because in my transportation idea, I would need to factor in the socio-economic aspect of innovation. I really want to build a similar concept of transportation as this one but on a global scale.

Modern societies require a high and varying mobility, which requires a complex system of transport and adapted to the social needs, to ensure the movement of people and goods in an economically efficient way and secure, but it is all subject to a new environmental rationality and logic to the new the sustainability paradigm. From this perspective, an efficient, flexible system of transport patterns that provide smart and sustainable mobility is essential for our economy and our quality of life. The current system of transport poses increasing challenges and significant for the environment, human health and the sustainability of the project, in both that the current schemes for mobility have focused much greater in the private vehicle that has been conditioned on both forms of life of citizens and cities as urban sustainability and territorial.

Effects of the e-commerce on transport but not all of the services offered by ICTS contribute clearly to reduce the mobility needs. Purchase on line, which facilitates buy products in faraway places, you can have a negative impact on the environmental impact of that purchase. Although spared the displacement to the store, the transport of the goods you can compensate for and overcome this positive contribution. E-commerce, therefore, can have two opposite effects on the transport, on the one hand, improves their efficiency, but on the other hand, it can carry an associated increase in kilometers. In particular, the Internet and electronic commerce are having a major impact on air transport. Sales of airline tickets on the Internet have led to an increase in the use of this means of transport, in large measure by the decline in its price, which is now within the reach of many more pockets. This implies a negative environmental impact, since it causes the increase of atmospheric pollutants, particularly CO2.

In the wake of the vertiginous increase of the density of cars in the large cities, many governments have begun to limit the use of private cars in the streets, in many cases, without a clear alternative. It is not the case of Israel, which has been found in a solution of the Californian Company SkyTran a fast means of transport, clean and economical.

Before the global need for part of the large cities to reduce the polluting effects and high levels of traffic density that affects the day of the people, SkyTran offers an innovative public transport: it consists in the development of a network of transit high by the circulating, at speeds of up to 240 km/h, different light vehicles by way of capsules capable of carrying two people each.

SkyTran has already designed some development projects in various countries such as the United States or India, but all none has yet received green light for its implementation. Only Israel has decided to implement a pilot project of this transport system, the results of which will be without doubt reference in deciding your extension both in this as in other countries.

The important social, economic and environmental transport is indisputable. The society values each day more mobility and has a significant effect on their quality of life. An adequate transport system is the backbone of the economy, even more when we are immersed in a global market, which is simple, and sometimes cheaper, buy thousands of kilometers that around the corner. But the transport is also associated with some of the major environmental problems.

Traffic congestion, pollution or noise in the urban centers is some of the main problems that they face the local authorities. At the global level, the transport is in the crosshairs of the priority actions to control the human effect on climate. Improvements in mobility have also brought the growth of traffic. Transport policies recognize the need to restrict their growth. The actions to improve the mobility should not be geared solely to create new infrastructure, to return to be congested in a more or less long period, but to design a system of sustainable mobility, social and environmentally, to improve its efficiency, but avoid, if possible, the unnecessary travel.

Socially, the effects of transport are varied and affect many facets of the quality of life of the people, to your relationship needs access to services (labor, health, products), also affect their health (quality of the air they breathe, noise) and its security (accidents).  Information and communication technologies (ICTS) can have two important implications in the transport, one through the incorporation of vehicles and traffic control systems, and another, through the reduction of the travel demand with the use of support services in information technologies. Telecommuting, distance education and the remote control of the facilities can reduce the transport needs, offering a service without requiring a physical movement. Other services, such as the trade online, can have a negative contribution, as they put at our fingertips articles that must be transported long distances up to us. In this article let’s take a look at some of the environmental and social benefits of the incorporation of ICTS in the means of topic is very broad, so we will focus only on some of its aspects, especially those that affect the road transport and urban transport. I would also need to consider the carbon foot print of my technological innovation in transportation.

Climate Change has already left the offices of the experts. Its effects are each day more clearly for all and the concern begins to be noticed in the street. Transportation accounts for approximately 24% of carbon dioxide emissions and is the source that is growing more significantly (in accordance with United Nations documents).  In particular, road transport accounts for 84% of CO2 emissions attributable to transport. Pollutant emissions due to transportation are also increasing. Emissions of greenhouse gases continue to increase as the increase in demand for transportation (of goods and passengers) more than offsets the reduction due to technological improvements and the adoption of more stringent regulations. Air pollution affects seriously to major urban centers, which are considerably diminished the quality of life of its inhabitants and affects their health. In addition to CO2 emissions, there are many environmental impacts that the transport creates in the nature. The infrastructure of transport by road or rail affect the natural environment, create barriers for the animals, which prevent its normal move, destroy their habitat, generates noise and large amount of waste. Also the air transport usually presents problems with noise and to the marine transport must be taken into account the risk of accidents which might cause ecological disaster. Reducing the demand transport is not an end in itself, but that allows us to obtain a service: education, health, work, leisure information technologies can enable us that service without a physical movement. The transport we are dealing with many of those of us who live in the large cities much of our time and patience.

The purpose of a global action plan for green transportation of goods is to promote an environmentally friendly transport of goods with the environment within countries and across its borders in order to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and other atmospheric pollutants highly prejudicial.

For this reason it is necessary to expand and harmonize the programs of environmental transport of goods and improve energy efficiency at the same time protect the public health and promotes innovation in the supply chain of global transportation of goods.

According to the publication Global Overview of the energy of the International Energy Agency, the transportation sector is responsible for approximately 22% of CO2 emissions and nearly 19% of emissions of carbon black, which greatly contributes to climate change and has a significant negative impact on health.

The programs and initiatives for the ecological transport of goods are gaining momentum programs for ecological transport of goods contribute to accelerate the adoption of advanced technologies and strategies to save fuel, reduce the costs of the companies and involve a significant reduction of emissions of C02, black carbon, suspended particulate matter and other emissions of pollutant gases in the transport sector as a whole.

In some countries and regions have already been launched in various associations, initiatives and programs of voluntary collaboration to promote ecological transport with the aim of introducing improvements that exceed the normal screenings. This includes programs and initiatives for ecological transport of goods.

In the framework of my plan of action, a program for ecological transport of goods mixture the accounting and disclosure of carbon emissions with the plans of action, collaborative activities and the acknowledgment of the efforts of the companies, such as, for example through a label. One initiative could involve work with a subset of those activities, carry out research tasks or work to support the programs.

The most effective programs offer significant commercial benefits by encouraging investment in fuel economy, reduced emissions and the use of technology as well as operational strategies. These result in a significant reduction in costs and a few actual environmental benefits. Considering all economic, environmental, social, as well as financial factors, I feel strongly about my ideas for innovation in global transportation. I feel that the benefits that would derive from my ideas would be firstly, convenient, comfortable, and quick transportation for the general population. Next, the environmental benefits of conserving the eco-system would certainly help the sustainability of the planet’s atmosphere. This is a very important factor because most transportation systems are hazardous to the environment and to our health. Also, my ideas for innovation in transportation would benefit the economy by both saving money and creating jobs.