810 kg pallet of 30 solar panels has a nameplate capacity of 9750 watts and requires about 100 cubic feet.
So if the train were carrying pallets of solar panels, each wagon could hold about 19 pallets. 1102 pallets for the whole train. With a nameplate capacity of 10.74MW.
So burning the trainload of coal in a power plant produces about as much electricity as a 12 minutes of sunshine on that many solar panels.
So, if you live in an area that tends to get more than 12 minutes of sun per day, you could save 11,000 train trips hauling coal for the next 30 years by installing solar just once. You save the electricity and diesel fuel for 11,000 train trips. You save the mercury pollution of 150 million tons of coal. You lock in your pricing, regardless of future coal or diesel costs. You produce more electricity. You avoid waste disposal of millions of tons of fly ash. You’ll certainly breath a little easier!
If you were to line up all of those trains alongside each other, they would cover an area over 20 square kilometers!
The solar panels would only cover about one fifth (0.20) of a kilometer!