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Here are the latest developments in the rail supply industry:

• Modesto & Empire Traction Co. recently tested National Railway Equipment Co.'s N-ViroMotive™ GenSet locomotive. The two-engine, 1,500-horsepower, four-axle unit is U.S. Environmental Protection Agency-certified as an ultra-low-emitting locomotive. The N-ViroMotive GenSet is designed to reduce nitrous oxide and particulate emissions about 80 percent, cut fuel usage more than 50 percent, and improve tractive effort between 50 percent and 65 percent compared with a conventional switcher. A short line, Modesto & Empire Traction serves an industrial park in Modesto, Calif.

• L.B. Foster Co.’s orders in May reached the highest total in the supplier’s history. Major distribution product lines — piling, new rail and relay rail — coated products and CXT® concrete buildings all reported strong bookings, the company said. The value of May orders totaled about $77 million, besting the previous monthly record of $64 million reached in February 2007.

• Jerry Woodall, co-founder and chief science officer of LightSpin Technologies Inc., has developed a process to provide supplemental power to diesel-electric locomotives using hydrogen. The process is designed to reduce soot and increase a diesel engine's efficiency up to 15 percent. Woodall is discussing a potential test with Florida East Coast Railway and has approached GE - Transportation about the technology, he said in a prepared statement.

• The Advanced Telecommunications Engineering Laboratory at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln has selected Azimuth Systems Inc.'s ACE™ 400WB channel emulator for a mobile WiMAX technology study to investigate the performance and reliability of standards-based wireless networking technologies for the North American rail industry. Funded by the Federal Railroad Administration, the study will analyze the performance and feasibility of using 802.16e-2005 mobile WiMAX technology to enhance current wireless networking infrastructure.