From the GATX, the Arcticar - General American Transportation Corp.'s cryogenic railcar

Railway Age, May, 1991

Stop and think. How many fast-food chains are there in the U.S.? How many outlets do they have? How many tons of various foods do they prepare and sell, most of those food products arriving frozen?

The volumes are staggering. And much of the product moves by truck.

General American Transportation Corp. aims to change that, and it believes it has the vehicle in the GATX Arcticar, a big cryogenic boxcar introduced last month.

Big? This car is a Plate F car, almost 76 feet over couplers, and within a hair of 17 feet in height. It has about 50% more cubic capacity than a conventional mechanical refrigerator car, at 6,850 cubic feet capacity.

The refrigeration unit has no moving parts, so the problems with equipment failures on conventional mechanical reefers are not problems with the GATX Arcticar.

GATC, the railcar leasing subsidiary of GATX, is looking at markets that include shippers of frozen potatoes, meat, vegetables, poultry, and juice concentrates. Right now, it has a single car, GARX 68000. But an order has been placed with Gunderson for 30 cars, for operation by a producer of frozen potatoes. GATC sees this as just the start of a business that takes it back to its roots.

General American started out in the refrigerator-car business in 1898, in the ice-bunker days. It evolved into a company that now is the largest full-service lessor of tank cars. In the meantime, the old ice-bunker reefers were phased out, replaced by mechanical refrigerator cars, and now here comes General American once again with the cryogenic car.

Among the features of the GATX Arcticar:

-Refrigeration is by carbon dioxide. The car can be charged with up to 15 liquid tons Of CO[sub.2] introduced into a bunker running along the top of the car. At a charging rate of 450 pounds per minute, it takes about an hour to provide a 15-ton charge. The liquid changes into vapor and dry ice flakes as it reaches piping nozzles in the bunker. The vapor, heavier than air, moves down through vents onto and around the lading.

Frozen products are loaded at zero degrees F and lower. The temperature of the solid CO[sub.2] flakes, or snow, is minus 109 degrees F. Thus, the solid CO[sub.2] in the bunker sublimates in an effort to equalize the temperature of the bunker with that of the lading. In an uninsulated bunker, the rate of sublimation is greater because there is no thermal break between the bunker and the load-carrying unit, but with an insulated bunker, sublimation is more controlled and slower, keeping the temperature in the lading compartment closer to zero than to 109 below.

-Depending upon outside ambient temperatures and product characteristics, it's estimated that sublimation of all the CO[sub.2] in the bunker would not occur for 15 days or more, with a full 15-ton charge.

-The car interior is constructed of reinforced fiberglass panels with 5-inch foamed-in-place polyurethane insulation and tight door seals in order to provide constant and uniform temperature control. Side walls of the car interior as well as the interior of the plug doors are corrugated to provide for flow of coolant, and the floor is grooved for the same purpose.

-The car can be charged from a CO[sub.2] truck or from a permanent terminal charging facility.

* Savings for shippers. What do the economics look like?

First, consider the rail movement of frozen foods in 1989, which totaled about 2.2 million tons-not much, in comparison with the total tonnage moving by truck.

Of the rail movements, more than 45% was accounted for by shipments of frozen potatoes, with frozen meat coming in at almost 16% and vegetables at 13.6% and with poultry and juices making up most of the rest of the traffic

The motor carrier predominates in movement of these products. But General American has done the numbers to indicate that the GATX Arcticar can produce savings, not just compared with conventional mechanical refrigerator cars but also compared with the reefer trailer.

On a movement from Washington state to New York, GATC says, typical savings per pound after car rental and the cost of the C02 would amount to $.013 compared with use of a mechanical refrigerator car. That translates into savings of $1.3 million for a shipper moving 100 million pounds per year, and savings of $6.5 million for a shipper moving 500 million pounds per year.

Savings with GATX Arcticar as opposed to truck movement may be a lot greater on a similar Washington-New York move. Perpound, the savings are estimated at $.031, which translates into a $3. 1 -million saving for the 100-million-pound shipper annually and a $15.5-million saving for the 500-million pound shipper.

General American's push for the new car got an added push at the unveiling from the chairman, president and chief executive officer of GATX, Jim Glasser, and from the president of GATC, Ward Fuller.

And as Bob Lynch, senior vice president-sales and marketing for General American put it, "The GATX Arcticar was designed from the ground up based upon growing needs expressed by shippers in the frozen-food industry. The state-of-the-art design, combined with its high-quality performance features, makes the car unique and makes it the most cost-efficient cryogenic railcar in the industry today."