IEA 2019. All rights reserved.
IEA 2019. All rights reserved. |
The Future of Rail |
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Opportunities for energy and the environment |
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facilitating better integration of mobility services,18 in both passenger and freight, in which there is strong potential for rail to play a central role.
Freight rail
Freight transport activity by rail, measured in tonne-kilometres per year, increased overall at an Page | 41 average pace similar to that of passenger rail over the past two decades. Activity growth from 1995-2005 was very rapid, but slowed between 2005 and 2010, and remained almost constant
between 2010 and 2015 (Figure 1.16, left). Similar to passenger rail services, most rail freight activity is concentrated in a few regions, though not necessarily overlapping. North America, China, Russia and India have the highest levels of freight rail activity.
Comparing freight and passenger train-kilometres, Canada, Mexico and the United States (where rail infrastructure is primarily used for freight) freight train activity outweighed passenger train activity by 14 to 1 in 2016, (Figure 1.16, right). The primacy of freight rail is also discernible in Russia (2.2 freight train-kilometres for every passenger train-kilometre), in Brazil (1.9) and Australia (1.9).19 By contrast, the European Union, Japan and Korea employ the rail networks primarily for passenger transport. These differences are reflected both in prioritisation policies and infrastructure ownership; for example freight trains get network priority in North America and South Africa, while passenger services are prioritised in the European Union, India and Japan.
Figure 1.16 Freight rail activity in selected countries, 1995-2016 (left) and share of passenger and freight trains in total train-kilometres, 2016 (right)
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12 |
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Rest of |
100% |
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10 |
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the world |
90% |
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Europe |
80% |
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Passenger |
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70% |
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km |
8 |
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train-km |
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India |
60% |
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tonne- |
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6 |
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China |
50% |
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Trillion |
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40% |
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4 |
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Russia |
30% |
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Freight |
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2 |
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20% |
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train-km |
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North |
10% |
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0 |
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America |
0% |
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1995 |
2000 |
2005 |
2010 |
2016 |
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Note: In the figure on the left, freight volumes in Japan and Korea are |
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in the |
rest of the world category. The most significant countries in the rest of |
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Sources: IEA assessment, based on UIC (2018a); National Bureau of Statis |
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Railways |
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(2018a); (Japan Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Tourism (2018); |
(2017) |
Russian |
Service |
(2018). |
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Key message • Freight rail activity has risen steadily over the last twenty years. |
rail |
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activity relative to passenger rail activity varies significantly from country to country. |
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18Often referred to as “Mobility as a Service” (MaaS).
19The context situation in Europe and the United States has been explored in the literature, including in the work of
(Vassallo and Fagan, 2007).
The Future of Rail
Opportunities for energy and the environment
IEA 2019. All rights reserved.
Box 1.5 Usage patterns of freight rail services
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Countries characterised by strong reliance on freight rail for the movement of goods tend to be |
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those having both high train loading and long distances to cover (Figure 1.17). Countries with |
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such large surface areas and abundant raw material resources include Russia and the United |
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States, where freight rail journeys are characterised by the longest average distance worldwide |
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(more than 1 600 kilometres, twice the world average) carried on freight trains which are among |
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the largest in the world, with average loads ranging between 2 200 and 2 900 tonnes per train. |
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Average distances are less in China and India (between 600 and 900 kilometres) and so are |
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loads (1 500 to 2 000 tonnes per train, the same range as the world average). Europe and |
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Japan have the lowest average distances (less than 400 kilometres in the European Union) and |
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loads (less than a third of the values of Russia and North America and less than half of the |
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global average). |
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Figure 1.17 Average freight transport distance versus country surface area (left) and train loading |
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versus average transport distance (right), 2016 |
Average travel distance (km)
2 000
1 800
1 600
1 400
1 200
1000
800
600
400
200
0
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Loading (tonnes / train) |
0 |
5 000 |
10 000 |
15 000 |
20 000 |
25 000 |
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Country surface area (thousand km²) |
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South Africa |
India |
Europe |
Brazil |
China |
3 000 |
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2 500 |
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2 000 |
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1 500 |
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1 000 |
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500 |
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0 |
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0 |
500 |
1 000 |
1 500 |
2 000 |
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Average freight distance travelled (km) |
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Russia |
North America |
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Sources: IEA assessment, based on UIC (2018a); National Bureau of Statistics of China (2018); Eurostat (2018); Indian Railways (2018a); AAR (2017) and Russian Federation State Statistics Service (2018).
Key message • Average freight rail distances are typically higher in large countries and long-distance trains generally carry high freight loads.
IEA 2019. All rights reserved.
The share of total goods moved by rail varies widely across countries (Figure 1.18). By far, Russia has the highest share with over 75% of all surface goods transport being moved by freight trains. In China the share is 39%. In the North America and India, rail makes up over 30% of surface freight transport, close to the world average (28%). The share is significantly lower in the European Union, 10% in 2016, while in Japan and Korea it is less than 5%.
Most surface freight is otherwise transported by heavy trucks (above 16 tonnes), 45% of surface goods transport on average in 2016. With rail accounting for 28%, medium trucks, light commercial vehicles and three-wheelers make up the remaining 27%. Even though rail has limited opportunity to replace intercontinental shipping, this freight category should certainly not be neglected as a potential market, which accounted for 73% of all freight tonne-kilometres in 2016.