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• Life cycle assessment of new Talgo lightweight prototypes

  . M.Cerdeira*, E. Guerra, F. García, J. Fernández, . V.Meroño

  Materiales Compuestos (2024). Vol. 08 - COMUNICACIONES MATCOMP21 (2022) Y MATCOMP23 (2023), (Núm. 4 - Sostenibilidad y Reciclaje), 14

  
  

  Abstract

  The European rail network is largely electrified, and rail emits far less CO2 than equivalent travel by road or air. It accounts for only 0.4 % greenhouse gas emissions from EU transport, while all EU transport accounts for 25% of the EU’s total emissions. Additionally, rail is the only transport that between 1990 and 2017 has consistently reduced its emissions and energy consumption, while increasingly using renewable energy sources. Following this green line, this article presents the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) study of new generation trains, mainly based on lightweighted primary structures made of composite material (about 30-50% weight loss compared to conventional ones). The composite materials are novelty in the railway sector. Their introduction brings a clear advantage from the point of view of train capacity or energy/infrastructure canon savings. However, it needs to be justified from the LCA point of view. Two different stages are developed in this article. An LCA of the new prototypes (production, assembly, transport and use phase). It is completed with an LCA of conventional structures. The second phase presents a comparison between the environmental impact produce using CFRP materials or metallic materials at the end of a useful life (EoL) of a carbody. The results indicates that, at EoL, the composite material would be more economically and environmentally attractive than the current materials.

  Abstract
  The European rail network is largely electrified, and rail emits far less CO2 than equivalent travel by road or air. It accounts for only 0.4 % greenhouse gas emissions from [...]

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