Life Cycle Assessment of Foam Concrete Production in Latvia

Abstract

Global warming being increasingly discussed, solutions for reducing emission greenhouse gases become more important in all industry sectors. The total energy consumed in the construction sector contribute up to 1/3 from all greenhouse gases emissions. Large part of it comes from the cement production – 5 % of the total global emissions. The foam concrete is lightweight concrete with good thermal properties and ability to reduce CO2 emissions by reducing the use of cement due to its low density. The aim of this study is to determine impact on the environment with the use of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) with focus on Global Warming Potential (GWP) for two different compressive strength foam concrete mixtures produced in Latvia by unique intensive mixing technology – turbulence with cavitation effect. Afterwards, the selected foam concrete mixtures are compared with alternative materials with similar compressive strength – aerated concrete and hollow ceramic blocks. The foam concrete mixture having 12.5 MPa compressive strength showed higher CO2 emissions than hallow ceramic block. The majority of CO2 emissions comes from the Portland cement, which is a key element in its composition. On the other hand, the foam concrete mixture having 2.4 MPa compressive strength showed higher CO2 emissions than aerated concrete block. The majority of CO2 emissions are due to foam glass granules, which is the main element contributing to the increased insulation properties of the material. Comparison of each foam concrete with analogue building material by compressive strength shows that the chosen foam concrete mixtures produce greater GWP than alternative materials. This research allows to identify the environmental impacts of different foam concrete mixture components and to improve these mixtures to achieve similar properties with less impact, for example, by replacing foam glass granules with granules made from recycled glass or replacing cement with flay ash, silica fume or recycled glass powder.

Sustainable Wall Solutions Using Foam Concrete and Hemp Composites

“…These also require a significant amount of energy in the production process, and a large amount of cement is required. If alternative types of cement with a lower environmental impact or foam glass from recycled glass were used, it is possible to lower the environmental impact of this block by up to 30 % [12]. Samples 1, 2, 5, and 6 have a similar GWP (82-96 kg CO2-eq/m 2 ) due to a large amount of cement consumption.…”

“…It must be mentioned that traditionally used wall blocks have a significant environmental impact [11], mostly due to using cement as a binder [12]. The use of fibrous bio-composite material is one way to reduce the environmental impact of wall blocks [13].…”

Operational Efficiency and Environmental Impact of Wastewater Treatment Plants in Lithuanian Rural Areas

“…LCA is a methodological structure that allows to calculate and evaluate various categories of environmental impact: global warming potential, ozone layer depletion, eutrophication, acidification, photooxidant formation, ecotoxicity, human toxicity, biotic and abiotic resources, which typically occur during a particular process cycle (Environmental Assessment…, 2000; Rebitzer et al, 2003; Navickas and Venslauskas, 2012; Zhang et al, 2013;Silvenius et al, 2019). The main impact category is global warming potential (GWP), which expresses climate change by the emission of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) and it is measured in CO2 equivalents (Goedkoop et al, 2010;Acero et al, 2017;Zimele et al, 2019).…”

Life Cycle Assessment of Post-Demolition Autoclaved Aerated Concrete (Aac) Recycling Options

“…Much research focuses on the LCA of building materials (e.g. Christoforou et al, 2016;Jonsson et al, 1998;Mitterpach and Štefko, 2016;Zimele et al, 2019). Additionally, innovative ideas and the use of secondary material in building materials' production are assessed in many studies using LCA (e.g.…”