Impact of Electronic Toll Collection System on Energy Saving and CO2 emission: A Case Study of Passenger Cars in Thailand

Traffic problems have been a long-standing issue for Thailand, although many measures have already been implented to solve them. Electronic Toll Collection system (ETC) is one of those measures used for reducing the traffic problems at the front of checkpoint on the expressway. However, there are no research studies on the effect of ETC on expressway transportation in Thailand. The objective of this study was to evaluate the impact of the four main factors (time, speed and acceleration, fuel consumption, and CO2 emission) on the ETC system compared to the Manual Toll Collection (MTC). In addition, four scenarios of applying ETC were analyzed to evaluate the potential of energy saving and CO2 emission in Thailand. In this study, Ram Inthra Toll Plaza, Bangkok was selected as a case study, and the car model Nissan March year 2010 was selected as the representative vehicle. Results found that time consumed for paying the fee at ETC was only two seconds which is faster than MTC about six times. Using ETC toll can reduce fuel consumption by up to 4 milliliter/trip and reduce CO2 emission about 9.7% compared with MTC. It is estimated that Thailand could reduce fuel consumption up to 1,262,471 liter/year with the reduction of 2,754 ton CO(2)eq/year, when ETC toll is applied to all the expressways of the country.