Comparative Life Cycle Analysis of Materials in Wastewater Piping Systems

Vahidi, Ehsan; Jin, Enze; Das, Maithilee; Singh, Mansukh; Zhao, Fu

doi:10.1016/j.proeng.2015.08.461

Cited by 20 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…Vahidi et al. (2015) showed that the production step leads to producing the highest amount of environmental pollutants and cast iron, concrete, FRP, and PVC cause the highest environmental issues, respectively. Vahidi et al.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Vahidi et al. (2015) compared five meters of pipes with the IMPACT method. In contrast, the present study evaluated 1 km pipes with CML and IMPACT evaluation methods.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…(Country Planning & Budget Organization, 2018). Fuel consumption for trench digging is the most important environmental release of the installation phase (Roghani et al., 2017; Vahidi et al., 2015). Hence, according to the past studies, the limited availability of information which is finding the differences between emissions derived from the three scenarios, the same stages withdrawal from our study, and great processes such as excavation was considered.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Environmental life cycle assessment of different types of the municipal wastewater pipeline network

Asadollahfardi

Panahandeh

Moghadam

et al. 2022

Environmental Quality Mgmt

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With the onset of social life, humans have considered waste disposal as essential, and they have been able to repel it through brick and clay channels. Checking sewage pipes for energy consumption and a longer lifetime than other sewage system components is important. Climate change and exploitation of industrial resources have made environmental impacts, which are important factors in decision making. The purpose of this study was to introduce the most suitable type of sewage pipe considering environmental protection. Therefore, we applied the environmental life cycle assessment (LCA) method, using Sima Pro 8.2.3 software for the one-kilometer length of concrete pipes (300 mm in diameter), Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), and polyethylene (PE) (315 mm in diameter). Also, the BEES method and sensitivity analysis were used to validate the results. The comparison between three types of municipal wastewater pipes indicated that PE pipes are a more environmentally friendly option than PVC, and concrete pipes in pipe recycling, reducing extraction from untapped resources, and inefficient extraction of resources. Electricity, diesel fuel, and sulfate resistance cement consumption for concrete production are the most pollution elements in the LCA of concrete pipes.Usage of PVC granular, sanitary landfill of PVC pipes, and using hydraulic drill in LCA of PVC pipes are the most elements of generating pollution. The usage of PE granules, PE pipes landfilling, hydraulic excavator, and electricity consumption in the LCA of the PE pipes are the greatest polluting parameters.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Vahidi et al. (2015) compared five meters of pipes with the IMPACT method. In contrast, the present study evaluated 1 km pipes with CML and IMPACT evaluation methods.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Environmental life cycle assessment of different types of the municipal wastewater pipeline network

Asadollahfardi

Panahandeh

Moghadam

et al. 2022

Environmental Quality Mgmt

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Recent literature show that sustainability research in the water sector focuses mostly on the topics of operation and maintenance of the urban water systems [16][17][18], or it focuses purely on environmental impacts (instead of overall sustainability) [18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28]. Some studies look specifically at the life cycle performance of different pipe materials [29,30] or renovation methods [31] where the goal is to quantify the environmental impact of the products. Vahidi et al [30] calculates unit values for sustainability impact of four different pipe materials across the phases of production, transportation, installation, and maintenance.…”

Section: Sustainability and The Life Cycle Approach In Urban Water Asmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some studies look specifically at the life cycle performance of different pipe materials [29,30] or renovation methods [31] where the goal is to quantify the environmental impact of the products. Vahidi et al [30] calculates unit values for sustainability impact of four different pipe materials across the phases of production, transportation, installation, and maintenance. In such cases the main focus is the material, so rehabilitation work and the lifetime distribution of the systems are neglected.…”

Section: Sustainability and The Life Cycle Approach In Urban Water Asmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reviewing the Long-Term Sustainability of Urban Water System Rehabilitation Strategies with an Alternative Approach

2018

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It is generally difficult to assess the performance of an infrastructure with a substantially longer life span than economic models can handle, and the life cycle concepts in urban water systems are normally limited to single-asset projects. In order to explore the long-term impact of urban water infrastructure rehabilitation strategies, a life cycle approach for survival functions is suggested. A life cycle factor based on survival functions is introduced, which is a measuring value of the total expected service life of all pipes within a group of pipes. Another factor, termed the sustainability factor, is based on the relationship between the life cycle factor and a rehabilitation reference method, which makes it possible to correct the long-term performance of rehabilitation methods based on their expected service life provision. A case study presents the implications for investments in infrastructure rehabilitation when applying the sustainability factor in long-term planning, and shows the importance of considering the service life of rehabilitation methods when planning renewal interventions that minimize costs over their life cycles.

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Delayed pipe replacement halves environmental impacts but quadruples water loss

Clayton,

Mejía‐Marchena,

Jiang

et al. 2024

AWWA Water Science

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Scheduling pipe replacement is critical for water distribution systems (WDSs) when managing finances and water loss. WDS replacements are often delayed due to high immediate costs without considering long‐term environmental consequences. This study is the first to examine a real‐world WDS using a novel workflow transferrable to other WDSs that integrates GIS, hydraulic modeling, breakage prediction, and life cycle analysis to evaluate environmental impacts and water loss of five replacement schedules (25‐, 50‐, 75‐, 100‐, 150‐year intervals). Environmental impacts were reduced by half when replacement interval changed from 25 year to 150 years, yet volume of water leaked from the system quadrupled. Benefits plateaued beyond 50–75‐year replacement while water loss steadily increased. Lowering water loss through break management enabled one‐sixth pipe replacement without exceeding original leakage at 25‐year replacement. Results were robust to uncertainty parameters and assert the importance of equilibrating environmental impacts and water loss when designing pipe replacement frequency.

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Comparative Life Cycle Analysis of Materials in Wastewater Piping Systems

Cited by 20 publications

References 13 publications

Environmental life cycle assessment of different types of the municipal wastewater pipeline network

Environmental life cycle assessment of different types of the municipal wastewater pipeline network

Reviewing the Long-Term Sustainability of Urban Water System Rehabilitation Strategies with an Alternative Approach

Delayed pipe replacement halves environmental impacts but quadruples water loss

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