IEA 2019. All rights reserved.

Sources: IEA Mobility Model (IEA, 2018a) using assessments based on UIC (2018a); National Bureau of Statistics of China (2018); Eurostat (2018); Indian Railways (2018a); Japan Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Tourism (2018); AAR (2017) and Russian Federation State Statistics Service (2018).

Key message • Rail tracks have been progressively electrified, with the strongest efforts made in China, India and Korea.

The differences in electrification between passenger-kilometres, tonne-kilometres and trackkilometres reflect the following dynamics:

•The United States relies completely on diesel for freight rail transport, while other countries (including Russia and South Africa) rely predominantly on electricity for freight rail transport.32

•Passenger rail is significantly more electrified than freight in almost all regions: on average 74% of all passenger-kilometres are on electric trains and 48% of freight tonne-kilometres are carried by electric trains.

•Electrified rail routes have higher utilisation rates than non-electric ones. On average, electrified lines carry five-times more passenger-kilometres per kilometre track than nonelectrified lines, and twice as many tonne-kilometres. This reflects the priority given to electrification of rail network segments with high activity, where payback periods for the investment costs are shorter.

•Regions with higher reliance on urban rail and high-speed rail are those with the largest share of passenger-kilometres served by electricity, while other regions rely more on diesel. This is

because urban rail and high-speed rail are fully electrified, due to technical requirements, and enjoy high network utilisation rates, justifying higher investment costs.33

Energy intensity of rail transport services

Major factors influencing the energy intensity of rail transport (expressed in terms of energy per passenger-kilometre or per tonne-kilometre) include:

• Changes in the specific energy consumption of trains (energy/train-kilometre).

32For freight rail, the practice of stacking containers to maximise train loads may sometimes be a limiting factor for freight rail electrification. This is because maintaining the height limitation imposed by the presence of overhead line electrification (OLE) infrastructure means that maintaining the overall load while electrifying the tracks would require the use of much longer trains or the use of the "third rail" approach (rather than OLE). Both longer trains and third rail electrification would add costs. The solution of longer freight trains, combined with OLE, has been adopted in Russia, where electric freight trains are fully capable of transporting massive volumes of goods over very long distances.

33Note also that electric trains are significantly more efficient than diesel-electric, especially in situations where rapid acceleration and frequent starting and stopping are necessary, a pattern that is characteristic of urban rail. The rapid

acceleration of high-speed trains can only be achieved with electric trains.

The Future of Rail

Opportunities for energy and the environment

IEA 2019. All rights reserved.

Train size (passengers/train)

1 600

North America

83%

0%

68% 64%

78%

IEA 2019. All rights reserved.

Notes: toe = tonne oil equivalent; MJ = megajoule. Percentages represent the share of train-kilometres using electricity. Train sizes are represented by the ratio of passenger-kilometres (or tonne-kilometres) to train-kilometres. This would be a good indicator of size if all trains had the same capacity and capacity utilisation rate. In reality, this is not the case. Urban rail services, for example, are designed to provide greater capacity per wagon than other types of passenger rail services. The choice of ratio of passenger-kilometres (or tonne-kilometres) and train-kilometres as an indicator of train size is dictated here by limited data availability.

Sources: IEA Mobility Model (IEA, 2018a) using assessments based on UIC (2018a); National Bureau of Statistics of China (2018); Eurostat (2018); Indian Railways (2018a); Japan Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Tourism (2018); AAR (2017) and Russian Federation State Statistics Service (2018).

Key message • Rail systems that use small trains and have a high share of electric traction have lower energy consumption per train-kilometre.

Variations in train capacities and their utilisation rates depend on the specific circumstances of each region. Such conditions include the state of economic development, nature of the transport demand (passenger or freight) and the geographic and structural characteristics of the region.

As discussed in Box 1.3, income level has a strong correlation with occupancy rates for all passenger rail services (Figure 1.14). In addition, long freight distances usually imply high freight train capacities and loads (Figure 1.17). These are important factors affecting the energy intensity of rail transport. Figure 1.27 shows the variation of train occupancy across different

34 The trends shown in Figure 1.26 are determined by the combined effect of activity developments and the evolution of energy intensities (energy/passenger-kilometres and energy/tonne-kilometre).

IEA 2019. All rights reserved.

The Future of Rail

Opportunities for energy and the environment

Passengers / train

1000

900

800

700

600

500

400

300

200

100

0