Assessment of Sustainability of Locomotive Propulsion Technologies

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

6-5-2025

Department

Department of Civil, Environmental, and Geospatial Engineering; Department of Chemical Engineering

Abstract

The growing threat of global warming has created an urgent need to reduce the carbon footprint of transportation infrastructure. For the railroad industry, approximately 99% of the locomotives operate on diesel, which is a nonrenewable fossil fuel and can contribute considerable greenhouse gas emissions to the planet. The efforts to achieve sustainability are primarily focused on adopting cleaner fuel or electrifying existing railroads. This paper provides a comprehensive life cycle assessment (LCA) regarding the potential options. For alternative fuels, natural gas, biofuel, and hydrogen are considered. It was found that natural gas has the lowest life cycle cost, hydrogen can greatly lower the overall energy consumption, while biofuel is advantageous in reducing carbon footprint. For electrified railroads, the performance will largely depend on the type of power plants providing electricity. If the electricity of railroads is provided by a hydropower plant, the environmental impact will be reduced to a minimum. However, if the electricity is derived from hard coal, the carbon footprint will be even greater than conventional diesel locomotives. Social factors, such as stakeholder acceptance and safety concerns, although difficult to quantify, can also impact the adoption of certain propulsion technologies.

Publication Title

International Conference on Transportation and Development 2025 Transportation Planning and Operations Selected Papers from the International Conference on Transportation and Development 2025

ISBN

9780784486207

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