Locomotive Emissions Monitoring Program - Railway Association of ...

Audit of the 2007 LEM Report: As required under Section 5.3 the 2006-2010 LEM MOU, an audit of the 2007 LEM
reporting process was conducted in 2009. The findings of the audit determined that some of the values in the 2007
Actions Taken table were misstated or reported incorrectly. As a result, the 2007 inventory required revisions to the
number of locomotives reported in the total Class I freight fleet. The 2007 values listed in the Actions Taken table
and the 2007 Locomotive Fleet have been revised and will be shown throughout this 2008 LEM Report. The impact
of these inventory revisions on the reported 2007 emissions was minimal.
The recommendations of the audit related to data collection methodologies influence the results of follow-on
annual LEM reports. The recommendations have been incorporated into data collection and calculations for this
2008 LEM report.
Summary of LEM Data for 2008: Summarized below are the data collection process, input data and calculated
emissions from all diesel locomotives operating in Canada during 2008 on the 54 RAC member railways. Also
summarized are the emissions reduction initiatives of the railways and the RAC’s awareness generation actions to
improve the environmental performance of the sector.
Data Collection: The cumulative emissions reported in the annual LEM reports are calculated from data in a RAC
LEM protocol collected from each RAC member railway. The data include traffic volumes, diesel fuel consumption
and locomotive fleet inventories for freight, yard switching, work train and passenger operations. Freight data are
differentiated between Class I, Regional and Short Line operations. Passenger data are differentiated between
Intercity, Commuter, and Tourist and Excursion operations.
Emissions Calculations: GHG emissions are calculated according to the amount of diesel fuel consumed and expressed
as equivalents to carbon dioxide (CO 2 equivalent ). Similarly CACs, namely, NOx, carbon monoxide (CO), hydrocarbons
(HC), particulate matter (PM) and oxides of sulphur (SOx, but expressed as SO 2 ) are calculated based on the amount
of diesel fuel consumed, the emissions factors specific to an individual diesel engine type and duty cycles reflecting
a locomotive’s operational service. The amount of SOx emitted varies mostly according to the sulphur content of the
diesel fuel. Emissions metrics are expressed in terms of absolute mass as well as intensity, that is, a ratio relating
emissions to productivity or operational efficiency.
Freight Traffic: In 2008, the railways handled 346.34 billion revenue tonne-kilometres (RTK) of traffic as compared
to 361.62 billion RTK in 2007, a decrease of 4.2 per cent. Of the total, Canadian National (CN) and Canadian Pacific
(CP), the two Canadian Class I freight railways, were responsible for 93.8 per cent of the traffic. Since 1990, railway
freight RTK has risen by an average annual rate of 2.0 per cent.
Intermodal Traffic: Of the total freight carried in 2008, intermodal carloadings dominated at 22 per cent. Class I
railways’ intermodal traffic decreased from 84.73 billion RTK in 2007 to 83.32 billion RTK in 2008, a drop of 1.7 per
cent. Since 1990, container-on-flat car traffic has increased 242.8 per cent while trailer-on-flat car has decreased
67.7 per cent.
Passenger Traffic: Intercity traffic in 2008 by all operators totalled 4.88 million passengers compared to 4.48 million
in 2007. The carriers were VIA Rail Canada, CN / Algoma Central, Ontario Northland Railway and Tshiuetin Rail
Transportation. VIA Rail Canada transported 4.22 million passengers, that is, 94.3 per cent of the intercity traffic.
Commuter rail traffic increased from 63.39 million passengers in 2007 to 67.05 million in 2008, an increase of
5.8 per cent. This is up from 41.00 million passengers in 1997, when the RAC first started collecting commuter
statistics, an increase of 63.5 per cent.
Tourist and Excursion traffic totalled 354 thousand, a decrease of 6.3 per cent below the 378 thousand
transported in 2007.
ii LEM 2008