Soldato
Not as much as that perpetual motion engine apparently generates. It has to keep 1001 cars powered and warm against the crazy cold outside.
Then there would be no reason for the train to keep moving. Mr Wilford could have just built a bunker instead. The story needs the train to keep moving, because it makes the story's setting more brittle, more fragile, because of so many moving parts that can break down. I think we're supposed to feel a sense of doom, that sooner or later, something will inevitably break that can't be fixed.
There was an avalanche in the first or second episode, so not true. The unknown part is how they expect that track to have been cleared by the time the train circles back round to it.
Presumably both insulation and heating. That's why losing power is such a big deal. That's why there's a minimum speed - slow down too much, you don't have enough energy to keep the heaters on, and people and parts start freezing.
It's made of unobtanium, I don't know.
Like I said, these technical details aren't really what the story is about. What matters is the tension caused by the train being such a fragile thing, and that the outside world is so radically hostile to life. The point is that, while you may sympathise with the oppressed tailies, you worry that they could break some critical system in the course of their revolution, or kill too many people who have the skill to keep it running, causing human extinction.
Because that's exactly what happens in the film.
