Railway is currently envisioned as the most promising transportation system for both people and freight to reduce atmospheric emission and combat climate change. In this context, ensuring the energy efficiency of the railway systems is paramount in order to sustain their future expandability with minimum carbon footprint. Recent advancements in computing and communication technologies are expected to play a significant role to enable novel integrated control and management strategies in which heterogeneous data is exploited to noticeably increase energy efficiency. In this paper we focus on exploiting the convergence of heterogeneous information to improve energy efficiency of railway systems, in particular on the heating system for the railroad switches, one of the major energy intensive components. To this aim, we define new policies to efficiently manage the heating of these switches exploiting also external information such as weather and forecast data. In order to assess the performance of each strategy, a stochastic model representing the structure and operation of the railroad switch heating system and environmental conditions (both weather profiles and specific failure events) has been developed and exercised in a variety of representative scenarios. The obtained results allow to understand both strengths and limitations of each energy management policy, and serves as a useful support to make the choice of the best technique to employ to save on energy consumption, given the system conditions at hand.

目前，铁路被认为是减少人为排放和应对气候变化的最有希望的人和货运系统。在这种情况下，确保铁路系统的能源效率至关重要，以在最小的碳足迹下维持其未来的可扩展性。预计计算机和通信技术的最新进展将在实现新颖的集成控制和管理策略中发挥重要作用，在该策略中，利用异构数据显着提高能源效率。在本文中，我们专注于利用异构信息的融合来提高铁路系统的能源效率，尤其是铁路开关的加热系统，这是主要的能源密集型组件之一。为此，我们定义了新的策略，以利用天气和预报数据等外部信息来有效管理这些开关的发热。为了评估每种策略的性能，已经开发了表示铁路开关加热系统的结构和操作以及环境条件（天气状况和特定故障事件）的随机模型，并在各种代表性场景中进行了模拟。获得的结果可以理解每种能源管理策略的优势和局限性，并且在考虑到当前系统条件的情况下，可以为选择最佳技术以节省能源提供有用的支持。为了评估每种策略的性能，已经开发了表示铁路开关加热系统的结构和运行以及环境条件（天气状况和特定故障事件）的随机模型，并在各种代表性场景中进行了模拟。获得的结果有助于理解每种能源管理策略的优势和局限性，并且在给定系统条件的情况下，可以为选择最佳技术以节省能源提供有用的支持。为了评估每种策略的性能，已经开发了表示铁路开关加热系统的结构和运行以及环境条件（天气状况和特定故障事件）的随机模型，并在各种代表性场景中进行了模拟。获得的结果有助于理解每种能源管理策略的优势和局限性，并且在给定系统条件的情况下，可以为选择最佳技术以节省能源提供有用的支持。