Economic, environmental and grid-resilience benefits of converting diesel trains to battery-electric

Abstract

Nearly all US locomotives are propelled by diesel-electric drives, which emit 35 million tonnes of CO2 and produce air pollution causing about 1,000 premature deaths annually, accounting for approximately US$6.5 billion in annual health damage costs. Improved battery technology plus access to cheap renewable electricity open the possibility of battery-electric rail. Here we show that a 241-km range can be achieved using a single standard boxcar equipped with a 14-MWh battery and inverter, while consuming half the energy consumed by diesel trains. At near-future battery prices, battery-electric trains can achieve parity with diesel-electric trains if environmental costs are included or if rail companies can access wholesale electricity prices and achieve 40% use of fast-charging infrastructure. Accounting for reduced criteria air pollutants and CO2 emissions, switching to battery-electric propulsion would save the US freight rail sector US$94 billion over 20 years.

Solar Power and Energy Storage for Decarbonization of Land Transport in India

“…Direct electrification by conductive transfer of power, i.e., overhead lines or third rail, is suitable for some railway systems, but the electrified fraction of India's rail network is currently still small. Direct electrification may one day be used throughout India's rail network but as this paper will show, battery electrification is also a viable option, confirming the findings of other recent research [20]. The difference between direct electrification and the use of batteries in the rail system will have only a small effect on the overall pattern of energy use, because the energy use in railways is relatively small.…”

Rapid battery cost declines accelerate the prospects of all-electric interregional container shipping

“…Nickel manganese cobalt oxide, LFP, nickel cobalt aluminium and lithium titanate oxide are commercially available lithium-ion chemistries with the requisite cycle life, specific power, charge rates and operating temperatures to support container shipping applications 39,40 . The choice of battery chemistry depends on specific operational characteristics.…”

“…The optimized and high-throughput nature of port operations (average berth utilization rates typically exceed 50%) support high charging infrastructure utilization and associated cost reductions 45 . Adapting methods used for trucks 40 and trains 47 we estimate the levelized cost of a 300 MW charging station interconnected at the transmission level to be US$0.03 kWh −1 at 50% utilization, inclusive of hardware, installation, grid interconnection, and annual operations and maintenance costs across the system lifetime 48 . We model the volume of the ICE ship's combined engine and mechanical space, assuming a battery packing fraction of 0.76 and an 80% depth of discharge.…”

“…In the baseline scenario, the TCP of a battery-electric ship is lower than that of the incumbent ICE vessel only for ship classes larger than 8,000 TEUs over voyages of less than 1,000 km (refs. 5,40,47,49,50 ). Over longer voyages, the additional cost of the battery system, increased power requirements and charging infrastructure outweighs the savings from fuel switching and the efficiency gains of direct electrification.…”

Experimental and Theoretical Advances on Single Atom and Atomic Cluster‐Decorated Low‐Dimensional Platforms towards Superior Electrocatalysts

“…[ 1 ] For instance, thanks to the upcoming scientific advances, battery‐electric trains will reach similar prices compared with those of diesel‐electric trains at near‐future, thus reducing the environmental impact and making possible a pollutant‐free world. [ 2 ] Among all the renewable energy technologies, energy conversion has become a central pillar to construct efficient electrochemical devices such as metal‐air batteries and different types of fuel cells. [ 3 ] Up to now, noble metals (e.g., Pt, Pd, Ag) are still leading the field of electrocatalysis as the benchmark catalysts, [ 4 ] but their low abundance in nature and high prices drastically limit their practical applications.…”