Particle emission from rail vehicles : A literature review

Emission of airborne particles is a side effect from rail transport. This work reviews recent research on particle emissions from rail vehicles. Both exhaust and non-exhaust particle emissions are characterized by size, morphology, composition, and size distribution. Current legislation, knowledge of adverse health effects, and available and proposed solutions for emission reductions are also treated. There has been much focus on exhaust emissions, but only a few limited studies have investigated non-exhaust particle emissions, which contain a significant amount of metallic materials. A new method for measuring the airborne wear particle emission rate (AWPER) is proposed as a first step to guide new legislations and to focus further research on non-exhaust airborne emission, i.e., research on the generation mechanisms for particle emissions and their adverse health effects.QC 2012