Sebastian Stichel

Professor in Rail Vehicle Dynamics at KTH Royal Institute of Technology and Director of the  KTH Railway Group.

About

Professor in Rail Vehicle Dynamics at KTH since 2010. Director of the  KTH Railway Group since 2011 and Deputy Head of the Department of Engineering Mechanics since 2020. Board member SWEDTRAIN – Swedish Association of Railway Industries – since 2019. Vice-Chair Academia of the European Rail Research Advisory Council (ERRAC) since 2017. Head of Department of Aeronautical and Vehicle Engineering from 2017 to 2019. Chairman of the Shift2Rail Scientific Committee from 2016 to 2018. Worked more than 10 years at Bombardier Transportation. From 2003 to 2010 Manager Vehicle Dynamics with responsibility in Sweden, Germany, UK and France. Master and PhD. degree in Vehicle Technology at Technische Universität Berlin. Supervisor Prof. Klaus Knothe. Adjunct Professor at Beijing Jiaotong University since 2017. Member of the International Advisory Board of the National International Science and Technology Cooperation base on Railway Vehicle Operation Engineering of BJTU. Visiting Professor at University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign in 2013, at Southwest Jiaotong University in 2017 and 2019 and at Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee in 2019. Current research interests are wheel and rail wear and rolling contact fatigue, freight vehicle dynamics, ride comfort and active suspension, dynamic pantograph-catenary interaction (cf. Rail Vehicle Research Group).

Keynote presentation

Title:
Resource efficient rail transport systems: A railways perspective to REV

Abstract:
Railway Transport is already today in several aspects a resource efficient transport system. It is very energy efficient, has low CO2 emissions since it is easily electrified, has a high transport capacity in relation to the land use, and it is very safe. Nevertheless, researchers and vehicle manufacturers are working on further reducing energy consumption and emissions from rail vehicles with e.g., lightweight designs, reduced air drag or novel and optimized propulsion systems. Also, the infrastructure, is a very important an integral part of the system, where construction of new railway lines leads to substantial CO2 emissions in the building phase. Ongoing developments will be shown in the presentation. Another possible contribution to a more sustainable transport system is to change the modal split, i.e., to increase the share of rail transport as part of the whole transport volume, which is propagated for example by the EU. To increase the share of railway transport, it must be made as attractive and cost efficient as possible. Thus, in the presentation aspects of a more attractive railway system will be discussed as well.

Recording of the presentation: