CAF Power & Automation has scooped two coveted titles at this year's prestigious Global Light Rail Awards - Supplier of the Year and Technical Innovation of the Year (Rolling Stock) - and CAF has been highly commended in two more categories. The award ceremony, held in London on October 3rd, are the industry’s celebration of innovation and excellence.
CAF Power and Automation won the Supplier of the Year award. The company offers modular and flexible systems that can be integrated both in new trains and trams as well as those in service. Adapted to each customer's specific requirements, CAF Power ensures the highest possible levels of efficiency and quality.
Also, CAF Power pick The Technical Innovation of the Year (Rolling Stock) Award for the company's ambitious Greentech initiative.
Offering a range of the most efficient and eco-friendly products, Greentech's main advantages are optimising energy consumption and reducing the visual impact of trams in city centres through catenary-free technology. This innovative technology has been successfully implemented in several cities around the globe, including Luxembourg, Seville and Granada in Spain and Birmingham in the UK, ensuring minimum environmental impact and respecting buildings' historic integrity.
CAF was highly commended in the Manufacturer of the Year category, acknowledging the company's continued international growth, including the new manufacturing facility built in Newport, Wales, alongside on-going industry innovations.
Also singled out for recognition - receiving highly commended in the Outstanding Engineering Achievement category - was CAF's Birmingham city centre catenary-free tram project.
In 2016 Transport for the West Midlands announced that Birmingham would be the first city in the UK to use cutting-edge catenary-free technology fitted to its fleet of 21 Urbos 3 trams, manufactured by CAF and introduced into service during 2014-2015.
Currently two trams have been retrofitted with CAF Power and Automation-supplied Greentech On-board Energy Storage (OESS), with the project on schedule for the full Midland Metro-operated fleet to be retrofitted by August 2019.
CAF UK Director Richard Garner collected the awards commented: "We are delighted to have won two awards and been highly commended in two more".
"As a leading global light rail manufacturer, it is extremely rewarding that innovations applied both within the UK and overseas have been acknowledged by the judges as achieving world class status."
"In particular, it is pleasing that CAF Power's leading-edge catenary-free technology, allowing trams to operate under their own power without the need for the visual intrusion of overhead line equipment, continues to gain recognition."
"This sustainable system generates a number of significant capital and operational cost benefits to promoters and operators of tram systems around the world."