Scaling Relationships of Dissipation-Induced Pavement–Vehicle Interactions

Abstract

Rolling resistance is one of the key factors that affect the fuel efficiency of the national pavement system. In addition to pavement texture and pavement roughness, the dissipation of mechanical work provided by the vehicle because of viscous deformation within the pavement structure has been recognized as a relevant factor contributing to the environmental footprint of pavement systems. This dissipation depends on material and structural parameters that can be optimized to increase the fuel efficiency of pavements. Identifying the key material and structural parameters that drive this dissipation is the focus of this paper. This identification is achieved by a combination of dimensional analysis and model-based simulations of the dissipation of a viscoelastic beam on an elastic foundation. For linear viscoelastic systems, the dissipation is found to scale with the square of the vehicle weight and with the inverse of the viscous relaxation time, in addition to distinct power relations of top-layer stiffness, thickness, and subgrade modulus. These scaling relations can be used by pavement engineers to reduce such pavement-inherent dissipation mechanisms and increase the fuel efficiency of a pavement design. An example shows the application of these scaling relations with data extracted from FHWA's Long-Term Pavement Performance database for seven road classes. The scaling relations provide a means for evaluating the performance of the various road classes in terms of the fuel efficiency related to dissipation.

Potential Contribution of Deflection-Induced Fuel Consumption to U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions

“…One of the important parameters used to estimate deflection-induced EFC is the ambient temperature. It was already shown that EFC related to the rigidity of pavements has no difference at 0°C, whereas this difference at 30°C is more than 250% (15). Therefore, we considered the monthly fuel consumption to improve the accuracy of the model estimation by capturing climate effects over the year.…”

“…As the reference temperature of the relaxation time was set to 10°C, the historical E modulus calculated values of the back-calculation at the temperature of 10 ± 1°C were screened and assigned to each segment. The modeling assumptions include the relaxation time’s reference temperature of 0.008293324, the average total number of axles of 3, and a total axle load of 0.37 MN ( 15 ). The relaxation time–temperature dependence constant 1 and 2 were adopted from Pouget et al ( 16 ) as 34 and 203, respectively.…”

Risk of Pavement Fracture due to Eigenstresses at Early Ages and Beyond

“…For a typical jointed concrete pavement, the joints spacing is 15 ft (4.572 m). In addition, the typical value for the Winkler length 4 EI/k V varies between 1-3 m (Louhghalam et al 2014); thus γ ranges from 0.762 to 2.286 below the critical value of γ cr = 3.3446. This ensures that the maximum moment occurs in midspan of the beam and the fracture process is stable, which is in agreement with the model assumptions.…”

Effect of Pavement-Vehicle Interaction on Highway Fuel Consumption and Emission

“…Its effect on vehicle rolling resistance and fuel consumption has gained increased attention by researchers and engineers in recent years (Arbarian & Ulm, 2012;Louhghalam, et al, 2014). Vehicle and tire properties are the main factors that affect vehicle fuel consumption.…”

“…Studies has been carried out by Louhgalam and Chatti (Louhghalam, et al, 2014) (Chatti & Zaabar, 2012) and demonstrated that the mechanic work dissipated within vehicle's suspension system when traveling on uneven roadway surface lead to excess energy consumption and thus excess fuel consumption. Pavement deflection/stiffness has 4 also demonstrated measurable effect on fuel efficiency regardless of vehicle type.…”