Putting sustainability theory into roadway design practice: Implementation of LCA and LCCA analysis for pavement type selection in real world decision making

Batouli, Mostafa; Bienvenu, Michael; Mostafavi, Ali

doi:10.1016/j.trd.2017.02.018

Cited by 65 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…In this study, data uncertainty is assessed and quantified for NPK savings, as well as by products of the process, namely, syngas and bio-oil. As we do not have access to empirically-based data related to those uncertainties, one can apply the same arbitrary variation to the uncertainties [53], e.g., a coefficient of 10% from the nominal value of the uncertain variable [54,55]. Therefore, there is no specific rational for using ±10% variation, except for applying a conventional way of conducting sensitivity analysis when true ranges are missing.…”

Section: Uncertainty Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Life Cycle Assessment and Environmental Valuation of Biochar Production: Two Case Studies in Belgium

et al. 2019

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It is unclear whether the production of biochar is economically feasible. As a consequence, firms do not often invest in biochar production plants. However, biochar production and application might be desirable from a societal perspective as it might entail net environmental benefits. Hence, the aim of this work has been to assess and monetize the environmental impacts of biochar production systems so that the environmental aspects can be integrated with the economic and social ones later on to quantify the total return for society. Therefore, a life cycle analysis (LCA) has been performed for two potential biochar production systems in Belgium based on two different feedstocks: (i) willow and (ii) pig manure. First, the environmental impacts of the two biochar production systems are assessed from a life cycle perspective, assuming one ton of biochar as the functional unit. Therefore, LCA using SimaPro software has been performed both on the midpoint and endpoint level. Biochar production from willow achieves better results compared to biochar from pig manure for all environmental impact categories considered. In a second step, monetary valuation has been applied to the LCA results in order to weigh environmental benefits against environmental costs using the Ecotax, Ecovalue, and Stepwise approach. Consequently, sensitivity analysis investigates the impact of variation in NPK savings and byproducts of the biochar production process on monetized life cycle assessment results. As a result, it is suggested that biochar production from willow is preferred to biochar production from pig manure from an environmental point of view. In future research, those monetized environmental impacts will be integrated within existing techno-economic models that calculate the financial viability from an investor’s point of view, so that the total return for society can be quantified and the preferred biochar production system from a societal point of view can be identified.

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Section: Uncertainty Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Life Cycle Assessment and Environmental Valuation of Biochar Production: Two Case Studies in Belgium

et al. 2019

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“…The predominance of these studies lacks an integrated evaluation of both environmental and economic aspects of pavement preservation treatments [9][10][11]. The few studies which have conducted such analyses show variations in the base data, goal and scope definitions and analysis methods and thus comparison among such processes cannot be readily made [12][13][14][15]. It is for this reason that a life cycle assessment of cost, embodied energy, carbon emission (CO2e) has been developed encompassing eleven treatment scenarios suiting the Zambian landscape.…”

Section: Figure 1 Relationship Between Pavement Condition and Life Cmentioning

confidence: 99%

Environmental and Economic Analysis of Selected Pavement Preservation Treatments

Zulu

Singh²,

Shaba³

2020

Civ Eng J

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Pavements are one of the highest assets and represent massive investment. The need to design and provide a sustainable maintenance service is becoming a priority and this comes mutually with the intentions to reduce impacts caused by maintenance treatments to the environment. This paper through a case study presents a Life Cycle Cost and Assessment technique during a 30 year analysis period to measure the cost effectiveness, embodied energy and carbon emissions of selected preservation treatments. These treatments can either be applied separately or in combination during the preventive maintenance of road pavements. This study entails three life cycle phases of material extraction and production, transportation and construction of maintenance activities. Through a literature review, raw materials energy and emission inventory data was averaged followed by the analysis of the equipment involved by using the specific fuel consumption to calculate the energy and emissions spent by the machine and finally the selected treatment energy and emissions was computed. Results show that preservation treatments can have an LCC of 30-40 % and embodied energy and carbon emission of 3-6 times lower than the traditional approach. This study bridges gaps in literature on integrated evaluation of environmental and economic aspects of preservation treatments.

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“…In recent years, the focus on incorporating uncertainties in LCA has increased due to the growing interest of regulatory bodies, industry and society on the environmental impact of products and infrastructures. Many studies have been conducted to categorise and quantify uncertainty in LCA models (see Baker and Lepech (2009), Heijungs and Huijbregts (2004) and Lloyd and Ries (2007) for comprehensive reviews) and also to assist the policy-making and design processes in specific areas such as construction industry (Batouli, Bienvenu, & Mostafavi, 2017;Blengini & Carlo, 2010;Hoxha, Habert, Lasvaux, Chevalier, & Le Roy, 2017;S€ ayn€ ajoki, Heinonen, Junnila, & Horvath, 2017;Tecchio, 2015), waste management (Clavreul, Guyonnet, & Christensen, 2012) and agriculture (Mackenzie, Ferguson, & Kyriazakis, 2014).…”

Section: Identification and Categorisation Of Uncertainties In Lcamentioning

confidence: 99%

Consideration of uncertainties in LCA for infrastructure using probabilistic methods

Ivanov

Honfí

Santandrea

et al. 2019

Structure and Infrastructure Engineering

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The construction and usage of transport infrastructure are major causes of greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption. The effects of resource consumption and pollutant emissions are often quantified through Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) models. All decisions made in infrastructure projects during the whole life cycle are afflicted by uncertainty, e.g. physical properties of materials or amount of pollutants emitted by certain processes. The pervasive role of uncertainty is reflected in LCA models, which therefore should consider uncertainty from various sources and provide a sound quantification of their effects. The aim of the work presented in this paper is to give an overview of different sources of uncertainty in LCA of infrastructure projects and to describe systematic methods to evaluate their influence on the results. The possibility of including uncertainty in a LCA-tool for infrastructure is presented, studying the sensitivity of the model output to the input parameters and two alternative approaches for propagation of uncertainty using two case studies. It is shown that, besides the influence of uncertainty in emission factors, other inputs such as material amounts and service life could contribute significantly to the variability of model output and has to be considered if reliable results are sought. ARTICLE HISTORY

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Putting sustainability theory into roadway design practice: Implementation of LCA and LCCA analysis for pavement type selection in real world decision making

Cited by 65 publications

References 21 publications

Life Cycle Assessment and Environmental Valuation of Biochar Production: Two Case Studies in Belgium

Life Cycle Assessment and Environmental Valuation of Biochar Production: Two Case Studies in Belgium

Environmental and Economic Analysis of Selected Pavement Preservation Treatments

Consideration of uncertainties in LCA for infrastructure using probabilistic methods

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