Rail emissions

26 Aug 2022 10:35 AM

Annual statistics covering electricity and diesel consumption of mainline passenger and freight operators in Great Britain and estimates of their associated CO2e emissions.

For details on how these statistics are compiled, please see our Rail emissions quality and methodology report and for information on any revisions, please see our Revisions Log.

Rail emissions data were previously combined into the Rail infrastructure, assets and environmental release.

Data and reports that include historic statistical releases on Rail infrastructure, assets & environmental can be found on the National Archives.

If you have any questions or feedback on these statistics, please contact rail.stats@orr.gov.uk

Key results

• Diesel and electricity consumption increased in the year April 2021 to March 2022. These increases led to a 2% rise in the total estimated CO2e emissions for passenger and freight (to 2,282 kilotonnes). This is the second lowest level since the comparable time series started in April 2011.
• There are new normalised electric and diesel metrics which allow for comparisons between the two traction types. Normalised passenger emissions were 358g CO2e per electric vehicle km, compared to 1400g CO2e per diesel vehicle km.
• For both passenger and freight trains, electricity emissions reduced despite increases in electricity consumption. This was due to changes in electricity generation towards more renewable sources.

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