Country-specific greenhouse gas emission factors of diesel-electric locomotive in Korea

This study developed the country-specific greenhouse gas emission factors as the Tier 3 level defined by IPCC guideline for the diesel-electric locomotives that have been currently being operated as line-haul railway traffic in the domestic transport sector of Korea. In order to apply the operating conditions as more specific data for the Tier 3 approach, the concentrations of CO2, N2O, and CH4 were investigated using the notch changes of diesel-electric locomotive under load tests. The measurement results found, for the greenhouse gas emissions in accordance with the power generated from diesel consumption, that the CO2 were 282 g/kWh while idling and 701 g/kWh at the maximum output (notch 8), respectively. In addition, CH4 were 0.0394 g/kWh while idling and 0.0103 g/kWh at the maximum output (notch 8), and N2O were 0.0181 g/kWh while idling and 0.0107 g/kWh at the maximum output (notch 8), respectively. The country-specific greenhouse gas emission factors were calculated through analyzing the activity data for the use frequency percentage of notch according to the operation mode at the travel service section of the main domestic routes using the diesel-electric locomotives. Finally, the greenhouse gas emission factors were proposed to be CO2 = 442 g/kWh, CH4 = 0.0241 g/kWh, and N2O = 0.0136 g/kWh. This study is the first attempt to develop the country-specific greenhouse gas emission factors considering of the operation conditions of railcars in Korea.