IEA 2019. All rights reserved.

Glossary

The glossary provides definitions for terms that are used in the report. Its primary focus is on terminology that is commonly used within the rail and broader transport sectors, but which may be unfamiliar to non-specialists.

Agglomeration effects: Refers to the phenomenon whereby industries and people cluster around Page | 169 a certain area, permitting an increase in productivity across firms.

Asset-based carrier: Refers to a freight carrier that owns the equipment that it uses to ship freight.

Average lead: The average distance that either a passenger or one tonne of freight is transported. In the freight context, it is equivalent to tonne-kilometres divided by tonnes transported.

Communications-based train control: Train and infrastructure communication systems, such as those that exist in the European Union (ERTMS), the United States (PTC) and Japan, designed and operated to prevent train collisions from occurring and which, in the process, allow increased traffic to operate on a given railway network.

Conventional rail: Refers to a rail service over medium to long distance, with a maximum speed of less than 250 kilometres per hour. It includes both intercity and suburban train journeys that connect urban centres with the surrounding areas.

Corridor: A broad route of no predefined size that connects major sources and destinations of journeys. It is composed of a nominally linear transportation service area that may contain a number of streets, highways and/or transit route alignments. In the case of rail, it can be, but is not necessarily, synonymous with a railway line.

Densified: In the context of this report, it refers to measures taken to permit rail lines to be used at high intensity with high utilisation, e.g. dense freight traffic flows are high annual freight movements along a specific railway line.

Diesel-electric: This very common rail propulsion method relies on a diesel engine that drives an electric generator, with the electricity produced then distributed across either the locomotive or the rail car (in the case of a multiple unit vehicle) to traction motors to drive axles (and eventually the wheels). Among other advantages, this powertrain design avoids the need for a complex gearing system.

Diesel-electric multiple unit (DEMU)/electric multiple unit (EMU): A multiple unit vehicle, often referred to as a DMU (diesel), DEMU (diesel-electric) or EMU (electric), which is an alternative to locomotive-hauled railcars. Frequently used for passenger services, each unit (which consists of either one or two railcars) contains its own propulsion system and space for passengers on the same vehicle(s), so a full train may consists of any number of multiple units, depending on the needs of a specific route. Thanks to its large number of powered axles and a higher power-to- weight ratio than its locomotive equivalent, a multiple unit train can usually accelerate more quickly than a diesel-electric locomotive-powered train.

Dedicated freight corridor: A corridor that is designed to service only freight railway traffic.

Digitalisation: Refers to the application of digital technologies (i.e. information and communications technology) across the economy (including in transport) to achieve desired outcomes, such as improved safety, efficiency and productivity. The “Internet of Things”, big data analytics, artificial intelligence and blockchain all rely on digitalisation.

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Opportunities for energy and the environment

Freight activity: Refers to the aggregate volume of freight movement in a given region, on a given mode, or on a specific route. It is measured in tonne-kilometres.

Freight wagon (wagon): A railway vehicle designed and used for the transport of goods.

Gauge (track gauge): Width between the inner faces of the two rails of a track. This can differ across countries, according to a few common gauge specifications.

Golden Quadrilateral: Refers to the physical linkages, both actual and hypothetical, between the four major Indian cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata, which form a geometric quadrilateral.

Gravity model: A statistical model used to estimate freight and passenger flows across an array of potential terminal location pairs.

Headway: The time that elapses between the arrivals at a given location of two consecutive vehicles on the same track. This term is generally used to refer to scheduled time intervals.

High-speed rail: Rail services that operate over long distances, operating at a maximum speed exceeding 250 kilometres per hour.

Intermodal: Designates the movement of goods or passengers in one journey via more than one mode of transport (e.g. a passenger taking the bus to the train station and taking the train from there, or a freight container first carried by ship then by rail and lastly by truck).

Land value capture: The increase in land value that arises based on greater connectivity and activity, and hence desirability, of property around railway stations.

Linke Hofmann Busch (LHB) coach: The passenger coaches of Indian Railways. They were originally developed by Linke Hofmann Busch, a German company, and in recent decades have been manufactured in India directly by Indian Railways.

Locomotive: A locomotive is a rail vehicle with a power of at least 110 kilowatts at the draw hook, and equipped with either a prime mover and motor or with a motor only. It is used for hauling railway vehicles.

Light rail: Tramways and other urban transport systems that operate usually at street level and at lower capacity and speed than metro rail.

Metro rail: Refers to a high-frequency rail service within cities, designed for high capacity transport (serving standing passengers and equipped with many wide doors for rapid boarding and exit). Metro rail is fully separated from other traffic and often operates on infrastructure that is primarily underground or elevated.

Mobility as a Service (MaaS): Refers to passenger and freight transport solutions that are consumed as a service, enabled by digital platforms that integrate numerous mobility options in a unified planning and payment platform.

Overhead line electrification (OLE): A system of support structures, wires (i.e. electric catenary wires), and other equipment (e.g. pantograph, which lies atop the roof of an electric locomotive or coach) that collectively transmit electric power from the grid to a railway vehicle in order to provide propulsion power to the vehicle and to supply other power needs.

Passenger activity: The aggregate volume of passenger movements in a given region, on a given mode, or on a specific route. These movements are measured in passenger-kilometres.

Passenger-kilometre: A unit of measurement designating the transport of one passenger over a distance of one kilometre.

IEA 2019. All rights reserved.

Occupancy: The number of passengers on a train. The average occupancy is obtained by dividing the total number of passenger-kilometres by the total number of train-kilometres.

Physical internet: The physical internet is an open, shared and modular system wherein all physical assets used in goods delivery are moved on multiple transport modes using standardised containers, a common protocol and common tools, shared transport and technological assets. In

the case of rail movements, the standardisation of the loading units, in particular, is crucial to Page | 171 minimising the barriers posed by goods handling for intermodal transfers.

Railway line: One or more adjacent tracks connecting two locations. When lines connecting different locations converge onto parallel networks (e.g. where a line from city A to B joins with a line from city C to B), the adjacent lines are not double-counted, unless both lines have their own track.

Railway network: All railways (of a given type, e.g. metro, light rail, conventional, high-speed rail) in a given area.

Ridership: The amount of people passing through a given system. In the case of rail use, this refers to the quantity of passengers being transported over a network or networks (e.g. within a given country) over a certain period of time.

Special purpose vehicle (SPV): An organisation/institution set up, often by a government, for a very specific purpose, with adequate operational independence so as to encourage private participation and ease decision making.

Tank-to-wheel (TTW) greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions: Emissions that are generated by a fuel while in a tank (in some cases, known as “boil-off” emissions) as well as emissions generated by fuel combustion. In the well-to-wheel framework, combustion emissions of biofuels are counted, though they may be offset or augmented by the well-to-tank emissions associated with producing and delivering the biofuel to the vehicle.

Tonne-kilometre: A unit of measurement in freight transport designating the transport of one tonne of goods over a distance of one kilometre.

Throughput: The amount of people or materials passing through a given corridor or system. In the case of rail use, this refers to the quantity of passengers or freight being transported over a specific corridor or network over a certain period of time. In the case of passenger traffic, throughput is nearly synonymous with ridership, though ridership typically refers to system or aggregate (country-level) volumes.

Urban rail: In this report, it refers to an aggregation of metro rail and light rail (i.e. rail within city limits) services. Regional and suburban trains are excluded from this category.

Well-to-wheel (WTW) greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions: Total emissions generated throughout the entire life cycle of a fuel, covering production, transformation, distribution and final use in a vehicle to power movement and other operations. These emissions are usually calculated as two components: well-to-tank (WTT) emissions and tank-to-wheel (TTW) emissions.

Well-to-tank (WTT) greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions: Refers to emissions generated during the process of resource extraction, transportation of the resource to a processing facility or power plant, fuel refinement/conversion/power generation, and delivery or transmission of the final fuel product to the point of use or vehicle tank, but excluding emissions during the conversion of the fuel to motive power.

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