A review study on traction energy saving of rail transport

Abstract

The energy cost of a rail transport system is very big especially for the tractions of trains in its daily operation. Continual effort on decreasing the traction energy cost intensities of various rail transport modes has been made by many researchers and practitioners on different aspects for a long time. From the rail transport operation perspective, this study reviews such energy-saving research mainly focusing on the optimizations of train coasting schemes, the rational designs and utilizations of track alignments, the ameliorations of train attributes, and the improvements of system operations. According to the review work, it is confirmed that in sound responses to distinct track alignments, dynamically optimizing control programs of trains with their reasonably improved attributes ought to be further studied in view of the systematic transport operation of a rail line or network in an integrated manner as much as possible in the future research on traction energy saving of rail transport. © 2013 Xuesong Feng et al.