High Speed Rail - Center for Neighborhood Technology

High Speed Rail and Greenhouse Gas Emissions – CCAP & CNT
Appendix A
ICE
The German Intercity Express (ICE) line connecting Hamburg, Frankfurt and Munich (line 6) travels at
an average speed of 131 kilometers per hour (81 mph) and consumes 24.09 kWh per train kilometer. 35
This is quite similar to the TGV energy consumption, but because of the larger number of seats on the
ICE trains, the per passenger CO2 emissions rate is calculated at 0.11 lbs (5.0x10 -11 MMTCO2) per
passenger mile at a 70 percent occupancy rate. According to Jørgensen and Sorenson, the actual
occupancy rate for this train in 1992-1993 was 61.4 percent. Lower passenger occupancies raise the
emissions per passenger mile factor, but we chose to assign a constant passenger occupancy to all of the
high speed rail technologies because the passenger occupancies of proposed high speed rail systems in the
U.S. in 2025 are unknown, so it is better to compare consistent measures.
Table A- 3 ICE CO2 Emissions Factor
ICE line 6 Emissions Factor
24.09 kWh/train km
689 seats per train
0.035 kWh per seat km
0.056 kWh per seat mile
1.40 lbs CO2 per kWh 36
0.079 lbs CO2 per seat mile
0.7 passengers per seat
0.11 lbs CO2 per pass mile
35 Jørgensen and Sorenson 1997.
36 DOE’s Annual Energy Outlook forecasts 3314 million metric tons CO2 emissions from electricity in 2025 and 5520 billion
kWh consumed in 2025, for an emissions value of 1.40 pounds CO 2 per kWh. National Average from U.S. Department of
Energy, Energy Information Administration. “Average Electricity Emission Factors by State and Region.” updated April 2002.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/e-factor.html has a U.S. average emissions factor of 1.34 pounds CO 2 per kWh.
A-3