An optimization model of energy and transportation systems: Assessing the high-speed rail impacts in the United States

• Presents a national long-term energy and transportation infrastructure planning model.
• Investigates HSR impacts on US using a cost-minimization network equilibrium model.
• Higher HSR penetration promises significant cost and emission savings over 40 years.
• HSR diversifies portfolio and provides travel efficiency and fuel shock resilience.
• Passenger mode shift is required to realize long-term cost and emission benefits.

This paper presents a long-term investment planning model that co-optimizes infrastructure investments and operations across transportation and electric infrastructure systems for meeting the energy and transportation needs in the United States. The developed passenger transportation model is integrated within the modeling framework of a National Long-term Energy and Transportation Planning (NETPLAN) software, and the model is applied to investigate the impact of high-speed rail (HSR) investments on interstate passenger transportation portfolio, fuel and electricity consumption, and 40-year cost and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. The results show that there are feasible scenarios under which significant HSR penetration can be achieved, leading to reasonable decrease in national long-term CO2 emissions and costs. At higher HSR penetration of approximately 30% relative to no HSR in the portfolio promises a 40-year cost savings of up to $0.63 T, gasoline and jet fuel consumption reduction of up to 34% for interstate passenger trips, CO2 emissions reduction by about 0.8 billion short tons, and increased resilience against petroleum price shocks. Additionally, sensitivity studies with respect to light-duty vehicle mode share reveal that in order to realize such long-term cost and emission benefits, a change in the passenger mode choice is essential to ensure higher ridership for HSR.