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How much power is generated by dynamic braking?

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CKape- that's the beauty of being grid-connected: when a locomotive goes into dynamic and starts pumping power into the system, all the other gensets' load-sensing regulators back off a smidge. The national grid has several TW installed, and runs close to capacity. Even figuring a dozen trains each with 4 or 5 locomotives each dumping 0.75MW into the grid, that adds up to 42MW-- about what a single modern Aeroderivitive natural-gas fueled peaker set puts out; peanuts to the grid as a whole. the big question is what an unpredictable +/- 42MW, (envelope) semi-chaotic swing would do to *local* line conditions; It might be smart to insulate the rail grid from the consumer grid with a series of storage stations; small pump/generate hydro, superconducting loops or a flywheel farm could absorb the shocks both outgoing and incoming. At the same time you could frequency convert so rail could run on a more convienient frequency. (DC, 25Hz, 400 Hz have all been suggested as possible substitutes) Out here in Kalifornia, we're trying to corner the market on those Aeroderivitive plants to keep from having blackouts again. There really are a lot of those going in, and they're designed to be fast response-- something like 90 seconds from 'secured' to full output, and even faster to regulate to local line conditions. So even without "buffer" stations between the RR and the consumer, I think the grid would be OK, assuming proper frequency stabilization.
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