CSX’s B20 rail testing yielding positive results

In Florida, CSX’s testing of 20 percent soybean oil-based fuel in a locomotive fleet serving a Tampa, Florida, phosphate customer began in 2022 to demonstrate the effectiveness of the B20 biodiesel blend in Wabtec FDL Advantage engines, and the project continues to yield impressive results.

The 10 locomotives in the test have burned more than 200,000 gallons of B20 fuel, which reduces greenhouse gas emissions by nearly 20 percent. The goals of the project are to provide verified emissions-reduction data, monitor the impacts of burning B20 on locomotive engine components, and gain approval from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for long-term use of higher biodiesel fuel blends in locomotives. 

Based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Wabtec has modernized the 10 AC4400 locomotives with FDL Advantage engine technology and will periodically perform necessary EPA emissions testing on these units at its Erie, Pennsylvania, facility. In addition, the CSX Mechanical Department has been collecting B20 fuel samples to verify its composition.