At SXSW Eco Discussing Transportation of the Future: the Hyperloop

Next year, Hyperloop Transportation Technologies, is breaking ground on a five mile test hyperloop outside of Los Angeles, said Dirk Ahlborn, CEO of Hyperloop Transportation Technologies.

The company wants to test out the technology, proposed by Tesla and SpaceX Founder Elon Musk, to ultimately create a high-speed transportation system between Los Angeles and San Francisco. The hyperloop would carry people in speeds up to 700 miles per hour in a capsule inside a tube moving in a high pressure environment like a pneumatic tube. The system is on pylons. With one tube, the hyperloop can handle three times the airline traffic between Los Angeles and San Francisco, Ahlborn said.

The hyperloop uses solar power and kinetic energy and produces more energy than it consumes, Ahlborn said. He delivered the afternoon keynote address at SXSW Eco on Monday.