Life cycle impact assessment of corrosion preventive designs applied to prestressed concrete bridge decks

Abstract

Chloride corrosion of reinforcing steel in concrete structures is a major issue in the construction sector due to economic and environmental reasons. Assuming different prevention strategies in aggressive marine environments results in extending the service life of the exposed structures, reducing the maintenance actions required throughout their operation stage. The aim of the present study is to analyze the environmental implications of several prevention strategies through a life cycle assessment using a prestressed bridge deck as a case study. The environmental impacts of 15 prevention alternatives have been evaluated when applied to a real case of study, namely a bridge deck exposed to a chloride laden surrounding. The Eco-indicator 99 methodology has been adopted for the evaluation of the impacts. As some of the alternatives involve the use of by-products such as fly ash and silica fume, economic allocation has been assumed to evaluate their environmental impacts. Results from the life cycle analysis show that the environmental impacts of the chloride exposed structure can be reduced significantly by considering specific preventive designs, such as adding silica fume to concrete, reducing its water to cement ratio or applying hydrophobic or sealant treatments to its surface. In such scenarios, the damage caused to the environment mainly due to maintenance operations and material consumption can be reduced up to a 30 to 40% of the life cycle impacts associated to a conventional design. The study shows how the application of life cycle assessment methodologies can be of interest to reduce the environmental impacts derived from the maintenance operations required by bridge decks subjected to aggressive chloride laden environments.

A Review of Multicriteria Assessment Techniques Applied to Sustainable Infrastructure Design

“…Studies have been conducted on cost optimisation of infrastructure design [4,5] and maintenance [6,7]. Attention has also been paid to the environmental impacts derived along the life cycle of structures, from bridges [8][9][10] to buildings [11], as well as those derived from particular construction processes, such as concrete production [12]. Social impacts related to the use of different building materials [13] for building construction [14] and for road infrastructure projects [15] have also been assessed in recent years.…”

Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment for Multi-Criteria Decision Making in Bridge Design: A Review

“…Fabianowski and Jakiel (2019) also devote their study to the sustainable assessment of different management strategies affecting a network of existing railroad bridges. Other authors apply MCDM techniques for the sustainable assessment of different materials for the design of bridges (El-Mikawi & Mosallam, 1996;Navarro et al, 2018aNavarro et al, , 2018bNavarro et al, , 2018cNavarro et al, , 2020Enfedaque et al, 2018). A main source of decision-making problems has been found to be the selection of the bridge type (Itoh et al, 2000;Ugwu et al, 2006;Wang et al, 2010;Balali et al, 2014;Kripka et al, 2019;Farkas, 2011;Gu et al, 2011;Arya et al, 2015) or construction techniques (El-Diraby & O'Connor, 2001;Pan, 2008;Salem et al, 2018;Jia et al, 2018;Mousavi et al, 2014;Chen, 2018Chen, , 2020.…”

“…From the abovementioned five stakeholders suggested by UNEP/SETAC (2009), social impacts on local communities are assessed by 39.5% of the studies, namely those evaluating impacts on cultural heritage, local employment generation, the externalities and the public acceptance of the bridge and its aesthetics. The stakeholder Society is taken into account by 14.3% of the studies, namely those considering impacts on the development of local economies (Ugwu et al, 2006;Aghdaie et al, 2012;Bansal et al, 2017;Cau & Hong, 2017;Navarro et al, 2018aNavarro et al, , 2018bNavarro et al, , 2018cSalem et al, 2018;Wang et al, 2018), on the social wellbeing and the inclusion of innovation (Wang et al, 2010;Ugwu et al, 2006) in the bridge design. The stakeholder Workers is assessed by 19.3% of the articles, which consider the health and safety related to working conditions as a main source of social impacts.…”

“…Efforts have been made to reduce the economic impacts of bridges by optimising the costs associated both to construction (García-Segura et al, 2014;Penadés-Plà et al, 2020a) and to maintenance (Sabatino et al, 2016;Navarro et al, 2018a). The environmental dimension of sustainability has also been assessed in studies focused on finding the most favourable design geometry (García-Segura et al, 2017a;Yepes et al, 2015) and maintenance strategy (Navarro et al, 2018b(Navarro et al, , 2019a. Hammervold et al (2013) compare the environmental impacts along the life cycle of three bridges considering routine maintenance.…”

Analysis of steel corrosion‐induced surface damage evolution of magnesium oxychloride cement concrete through gray‐level co‐occurrence matrices

“…19,20 It is no exaggeration to say that the formation of concrete cracks caused by the corrosion of steel bars affects the service performance of concrete buildings to a great extent. 19,21,22 The later maintenance and repair of concrete buildings are very important to extend their service time role. 23,24 Therefore, it is urgent to realize the dangers and early warning signs of concrete buildings and to apply intelligent maintenance in advance to avoid human casualties and the collapse of concrete buildings.…”