Diesel has become electric: the Panorama Train vividly demonstrates how Europa-Park combines fun and sustainability. Since the opening in 1975, miniature replicas of steam locomotives from the founding days of the USA have been travelling through the park, long powered by fossil fuels. Now, the Panorama Trains are all electric - “free of exhaust
gas and smell”, as Volker Klaiber, Director of Operation & Service at Europa-Park, emphasises. Behind the conversion is a highly complex and innovative process. After all, although new locomotives with electric motors in combination with lithium-ion batteries would have been available from the manufacturers of such trains, this solution did not seem sustainable enough for Europa-Park. So, in cooperation with the renowned drive technology manufacturer SEW-Overdrive, a very special technology was devised that is only available at Europa-Park. The trains are now charged inductively, i.e. without contact, at every stop. This idea of induction storage in particular is already being used in other attractions such as the ‘Blue Fire’ rollercoaster and the ‘Pirates in Batavia’ water dark ride.