Business director of ODOS, Umesh Patel, explores how crucial real-time data is for the real-world conditions batteries face as the rail industry switches from lead-acid to lithium-ion batteries
Umesh Patel, business director at ODOS, discusses the critical role of data in the rail industry’s shift from lead-acid to lithium-ion batteries
The transition from lead-acid to lithium-ion batteries in rail applications represents a significant advancement for the industry. While lithium-ion technology offers clear benefits – such as increased efficiency, longevity, and sustainability – understanding its full-scale performance is essential to ensuring optimal operation. Real-world collaborations, such as recent trials with leading developers like AMP Rail, have highlighted the crucial role that real-time data plays in supporting this shift. Data is crucial for assessing battery health, efficiency and longevity. The longer lifespan of lithium-ion batteries presents new challenges and without precise, real-time data, operators cannot fully understand performance boundaries.
Rail operators need detailed insights into how these batteries function under real-world conditions; without this knowledge, they won’t be able to identify inefficiencies or resolve potential failures before they escalate.
UNDERSTANDING THE SHIFT
For decades, rail operators have relied on lead-acid batteries to start diesel engines and power auxiliary systems. However, these batteries come with significant limitations, including short lifespans, lower energy density, and environmental concerns. Lithium-ion technology is emerging as a superior alternative due to its lighter weight, longer cycle life, and higher energy efficiency. Although they have a higher initial cost, they offer long-term savings by reducing maintenance needs and extending replacement intervals. However, the adoption of this technology without a comprehensive understanding of its real-world performance could lead to operational disruptions. This is where data logging becomes crucial.
TRANSITION CHALLENGES
One of the key challenges in transitioning to lithium-ion batteries is ensuring consistency in their performance. Variability between battery batches can present issues when deployed in the rail industry, where equipment operates under highly demanding conditions. Unlike consumer products, rail assets are in near-constant use, maximising uptime but also placing significant stress on the batteries.
These stresses are amplified by environmental extremes – lithium-ion systems must operate reliably in climates ranging from sub-zero arctic mornings to desert heat exceeding 50°C. Additionally, safety remains a core concern. The potential for thermal runaway and overheating means that detailed, real-world performance data is essential for both validating safety and ensuring resilience under pressure. Without this data, operators risk relying on assumption-led diagnostics, leading to avoidable battery swaps, inefficient maintenance cycles, and increased costs.
THE ROLE OF DATA
Data logging technology will play a pivotal role in supporting rail operators by providing real-time insights into battery performance. By monitoring key parameters such as battery degradation, charge cycles, voltage stability, and energy usage, rail operators can optimise fleet performance while reducing diagnostic times. Real-world implementations have demonstrated that with the right data, critical failures in harsh environmental conditions can be completely avoided, improving both safety and confidence in lithium-ion systems.
This shift to data-driven maintenance enables early fault detection, extends battery life, and reduces the need for manual inspections. Such outcomes not only prevent costly failures but also support long-term investment strategies by informing predictive maintenance schedules. As lithium-ion adoption accelerates, this kind of visibility is essential to overcome both technical uncertainty and legacy infrastructure limitations.
OVERCOMING THERMAL CHALLENGES
One of the primary concerns in rail applications is environmental exposure. Depending on where the data logger is installed, it could be exposed to elements such as water, dust, and extreme temperatures. This is particularly relevant in commercial trains, where frequent door operations expose components to external conditions. Additionally, trains operate at high speeds and are subject to constant vibration, which can be detrimental to electronic components, particularly those with moving parts. A data logger designed for this environment must be ruggedised to withstand such forces without degradation.
Thermal management is equally critical. Lithium-ion batteries generate significant heat during operation, necessitating integrated cooling solutions to ensure consistent performance and prevent failure. In proven rail trials, real-time logging of temperature patterns and current draw has been instrumental in mitigating risks such as thermal runaway. These systems must also have robust processing and storage capacity to manage high-frequency data capture across a broad temperature spectrum.
LESSONS FROM AUTOMOTIVE
Industries that rely on high-performance battery technology, such as automotive and aerospace, have long understood the value of real-time data tracking. A luxury sports car manufacturer, for example, used data logging to detect unauthorised vehicle use before it even reached the test track. Similarly, in rail applications, detailed monitoring ensures that improper battery usage, inefficiencies, or degradation do not go unnoticed, safeguarding both assets and operational performance.
DATA MANAGEMENT IS KEY
The transition from lead-acid to lithium-ion batteries in rail applications offers substantial technical, environmental, and operational benefits. Lithium-ion batteries provide longer life cycles, faster charging and higher energy density, while data logging and remote monitoring systems help optimise performance, reduce downtime and improve safety. By utilising cloud-based technology like ODOS’ solutions, rail operators can track real-time data, identify potential issues early and make informed decisions about their investments in new technology.
As the rail industry continues to embrace lithium-ion technology, the key to success lies in proper testing, training, and data management. With the right systems in place, rail operators can maximise the benefits of lithium-ion batteries, ensuring efficient, reliable, and cost-effective operations for the long term.
DRIVING LITHIUMM-ION ADOPTION
AMP Rail, a specialist in lithium-ion power systems for locomotives and industrial equipment, partnered with ODOS as part of its mission to meet the increasingly demanding energy and safety requirements of modern rail fleets.
The objective of the partnership was primarily to enable deep, real-time visibility into lithium-ion battery performance under the extreme and variable conditions faced by rail vehicles, and in doing so, accelerate industry-wide adoption of this cleaner, more efficient technology. AMP Rail recognised that data transparency is essential not only to mitigate the risks of lithium-ion batteries, but to also build trust around new technologies. To truly validate lithium-ion as a safe and scalable solution, the company needed to detect early failure indicators, prove performance across environmental extremes, and provide engineers with actionable insights in real time.
DATA SYSTEM DEPLOYMENT
To meet these needs, ODOS deployed its advanced monitoring and analytics platform across a pilot fleet of lithium-ion-equipped locomotives. Each battery system was fitted with embedded smart sensors and rugged data loggers capable of capturing key metrics including temperature, voltage, current draw, charge/discharge cycles, and degradation trends.
This data was streamed in real time to ODOS’s secure cloud-based platform, where engineers could monitor system health via a custom-built dashboard. This enabled early detection of failure risks and thermal irregularities and continuous verification of safe operation in extreme temperatures. This also allowed for automated diagnostic routines, reducing the need for manual inspection, and data archiving to support safety certification and regulatory compliance.
The platform was specifically tailored to AMP Rail’s operational protocols, with alerts and reporting tools integrated directly into existing maintenance workflows. This minimised the need for retraining and allowed for seamless adoption across depots and engineering teams.
INDUSTRY IMPACT
The results of the pilot were conclusive. AMP Rail recorded a dramatic reduction in diagnostic time for battery-related faults, zero critical failures under extreme thermal conditions, and notable fuel savings through smarter charge and idle management. Predictive maintenance, powered by real-time data, also contributed to longer battery life and more efficient resource allocation.
Perhaps most significantly, the data-driven approach helped reshape industry perception. By enabling transparent monitoring and proving resilience under field conditions, AMP Rail accelerated lithium-ion adoption among industry partners by an estimated five to 10 years.
As David Eldridge, AMP Rail’s lead on the project, notes: “The more data we have, the more confident the industry becomes in making the transition to lithium-ion. ODOS has been instrumental in giving us and our customers confidence. The system has removed the guesswork, and we’re already seeing the impact in reduced downtime and higher operational reliability.”
