Document Type : Research Note
Authors
1
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Geotechnics, Roads and Transportation Specialty
2
Postdoctoral, Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Amirkabir University of Technology, Tehran, Iran, rashidtanzadeh@aut.ac.ir
3
Professor Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Geotechnics, Roads and Transportation Specialty
10.24200/j30.2024.63847.3301
Abstract
Concrete is widely used in the construction of road pavement and various types such as continuously reinforced, jointed plain, jointed reinforced, precast, and eco-block concrete pavement. The different risks in the pavement industry include huge costs of construction and maintenance, substantial energy consumption, significant pollution emissions in the material production process, and the negative impacts of work zones on workers and the local community. The widespread impacts in the different life-cycle stages are evaluated using economic, environmental, and social life-cycle assessment tools, the accumulation of which form the criteria of life-cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA). In the present article, the history of the formation of LCSA is first reviewed. Next, the different steps required for performing an LCSA is introduced based on available standards. After that, published articles on concrete pavement LCSA have been reviewed. The previous studies were scrutinized and compared from various aspects: pillars of the analysis, life cycle stages, the unit processes in each stage, the types of analyzed pavements, utilized tools, life cycle inventory, and midpoint and endpoint impact categories of the analysis. The review showed a lack of consideration for the use phase (25% of studies) and end-of-life stage (20%). The factors taken into account in the use phase were roughness-induced increase of fuel consumption (10%) and vehicle operation costs (10%), and work zones giving rise to traffic delays (15%), or increased fuel consumption (10%). Pavement albedo, carbonation, and lighting were only considered in 1 analysis. CO2 was the item with the highest frequency in the life-cycle inventory (11 references). In the end, aside from suggestions for future research, a framework was devised for the scope definition step of analysis. The framework, which is exclusive to concrete pavements, covers all the processes that should be analyzed in the different life-cycle stages. With the implementation of this framework, the omission of unit processes is prevented and thus the obtained results are more reliable.
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