Environmental and Economic Analysis of Selected Pavement Preservation Treatments

Abstract

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.

The impact of economic and political reforms on environmental performance in developing countries

“…Economic reforms are a source stabilizing the financial market, the trust of investors and people restores if any type of reforms prevail in an economy so green technology will flourish the economy. The findings of the studies [ 8 , 9 , 14 – 16 , 19 , 59 , 60 ] convey that institutions have crucial importance for environmental performance. Based on the findings of the study, it is highlighted that economic and political reforms are both crucial for environmental protection in developing countries.…”

Effects of the Digital Economy on Carbon Emissions: Evidence from China

“…According to the BP Statistical Review of World Energy, China has been the world’s fastest-growing energy consumer for 19 consecutive years [ 3 ] and accounts for 29% of the world’s total carbon emissions [ 4 ]. Although carbon emissions show a certain positive association with economic growth [ 5 ], the large amount of carbon emissions will not only impact the climate [ 6 ], but also human health. Previous studies have shown that carbon dioxide can cause harm to human health through inhalation and skin contact [ 7 , 8 ].…”

Perceptions about water pollution among university students: A case study from Iraq

“…Although these countries found laws and policies to control, monitor and reduce environmental pollution, they fail to enforce them to protect the environment. Additionally, in the developing countries, the water supply systems are inadequate and delivered low water quality that resulted from water demand increases rapidly and discharges the untreated wastewater direct to the freshwater sources (Awoke et al, 2016;Zulu et al, 2020). WHO, 2017 stated that municipal water supply system must deliver safe and clean water (i.e., water does not have living microorganisms or harmful chemical substances in concentrations more than the acceptable limit).…”