Energy efficiency in transport – some surprises!
Posted: April 1, 2010 Filed under: Cars & traffic, Energy & GHG, Public transport | Tags: autos, commuter rail, Department of Energy, energy intensity, light rail, load factor, Los Angeles, sprawl, transit, Transportation Energy Data Book 3 CommentsThe latest edition of the Transportation Energy Data Book: Edition 28 was released last year by the US Department of Energy (Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy).
I’ve derived the accompanying graph from Chapter 2 of the report. There are a couple of points of interest here.
In particular, the data shows that load factors are very important. Although public transport is more energy efficient than cars when it is fully loaded, it has to operate at off-peak times and on secondary routes, when patronage is low. Read the rest of this entry »
The Melbourne Urbanist 