Uncertainty of building elements’ service lives in building LCA &amp; LCC: What matters?

Goulouti, Kyriaki; Padey, Pierryves; Galimshina, Alina; Habert, Guillaume; Lasvaux, Sébastien

doi:10.1016/j.buildenv.2020.106904

Cited by 70 publications

(38 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…Studies over longer RSPs have a longer operational phase and therefore higher impacts for both operational energy use and maintenance/ replacement. Goulouti et al (2020) show that the choice of RSP influences what building elements contribute most to uncertainty on the results. Vilches et al (2017) review LCA of refurbishment operations and point out that RSPs varied from 50 to 150 years.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Frischknecht et al (2020) showed that significant discrepancies exist between assessments using methods from different countries, even when they assess the same building. A recent statistical study by Goulouti et al (2020) found that maintenance and replacement processes account for 14-36% of life cycle GWP at the building level. Studies focusing on embodied emissions show that, in some cases, maintenance and replacement processes can account for about half of life cycle embodied emissions (Häfliger et al 2017;Petrovic et al 2019).…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This is equivalent to using a fractional number of replacements: Over 100 years, an element with a service life of 30 years is replaced 2.33 times. This method has been used for instance in Switzerland, Norway, and France (French Ministry for the Ecological Transition and French Ministry for Territorial Cohesion 2017; Goulouti et al 2020;Standard Norge 2017). The present article investigates the influence of the latter three aspects: the RSP, the choice of data source of material service lives, and the choice of round-up or annualized modeling for calculating the number of operations.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Influence of methodological choices on maintenance and replacement in building LCA

Francart

Widström

Malmqvist

2021

Int J Life Cycle Assess

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Purpose Previous life cycle assessments (LCAs) of buildings and building components show a broad range of values for the impact of maintenance and replacement, some highlighting these operations as major hotspots while others consider them insignificant. This article highlights methodological aspects explaining this discrepancy. The influence of three aspects is investigated further in a case study of façade materials: the reference study period (RSP), service life data, and the use of a round-up number of operations or annualized impacts. Methods A comparative LCA of seven façade alternatives is carried out as an illustrative case study. For each alternative, global warming potential (GWP) is calculated using three possible RSPs, four possible material service lives (one from industry practitioners and low, standard and high values from a generic database), and two possible calculation methods (round-up or annualized impacts). Results and discussion While the same façade alternative had the lowest GWP in all cases, different methodological choices significantly affected the GWP and respective ranking of other alternatives. Some alternatives showed a significant increase in GWP over longer RSPs, while others were still dominated by the impact of initial production after 200 years. In nearly all cases, generic service life data lead to a higher GWP than data from industry practitioners. Major discrepancies were found between generic and practitioner data in some cases, e.g., for the brick façade. In most cases, annualized impacts led to a slightly lower (or equal) GWP than using a round-up number of operations. However, when a major operation happens shortly before the end of the RSP, the annualized method leads to considerably lower GWP. Conclusions Maintenance and replacement are rarely significant over a 50-year RSP but sometimes become hotspots over longer RSPs. Using round-up operations or annualized impacts does not make much difference in average, but leads to significantly different results in specific cases. As building LCA enters certification and regulation, there is a need to harmonize such methodological choices, as they affect LCA results, hotspot identification, and recommendations. Discrepancies in service life data also call for the gathering of reliable data.

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Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Influence of methodological choices on maintenance and replacement in building LCA

Francart

Widström

Malmqvist

2021

Int J Life Cycle Assess

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…In other words, no durability period has been established or SLP has been performed. Indeed, databases that include the RSLV for building elements, generally cover interior elements like floors, walls and finishes, roof coverings, exterior insulation, doors, windows and structural elements [185][186][187][188], but not the out-of-sight BEMs. Yet, standard CAN/CSA S478-19 requires BEMs to last as long as the design life of the building itself because BEMs are concealed and not readily accessible for repairs [23], which may be prohibitively expensive if carried out.…”

Section: Knowledge Gapsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Critical Review of Polymeric Building Envelope Materials: Degradation, Durability and Service Life Prediction

2021

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This paper provides a critical review of the degradation, durability and service life prediction (SLP) of polymeric building envelope materials (BEMs), namely, claddings, air/vapour barriers, insulations, sealants, gaskets and fenestration. The rate of material deterioration and properties determine the usefulness of a product; therefore, knowledge of the significant degradation mechanisms in play for BEMs is key to the design of proper SLP methods. SLP seeks to estimate the life expectancy of a material/component exposed to in-service conditions. This topic is especially important with respect to the potential impacts of climate change. The surrounding environment of a building dictates the degradation mechanisms in play, and as climate change progresses, material aging conditions become more unpredictable. This can result in unexpected changes and/or damages to BEMs, and shorter than expected SL. The development of more comprehensive SLP methods is economically and environmentally sound, and it will provide more confidence, comfort and safety to all building users. The goal of this paper is to review the existing literature in order to identify the knowledge gaps and provide suggestions to address these gaps in light of the rapidly evolving climate.

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“…Multiple studies analyse the uncertainty of LCA and the methods to be taken into account to assess it [26][27][28]. For instance, the Gouloutis study [26] mentions various methods have been proposed to quantify these uncertainties and their impact on the LCA output: scenario analysis, quantitative uncertainty analysis, and sensitivity analysis. It is also commented that different studies have shown that the service life calculation is governed by high uncertainty.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Environmental Assessment of University Campuses: The Case of the University of Navarra in Pamplona (Spain)

et al. 2021

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Current European environmental sustainability standards call for achieving a reduction in energy consumption and CO2 emissions for a horizon set in the year 2050. It has been verified that buildings and cities have a higher incidence in this regard. It is necessary to have tools for initial assessment that can quickly analyse whether the improvement scenarios put forward by different organisations and governments will be able to meet the goals set at European level. Universities are an important factor for the intended change and therefore offer an excellent environment for testing such tools. A case study focusing on a university in northern Spain is presented, through an evaluation tool using 3D models including life-cycle assessment. Different reform scenarios are evaluated for two key years, 2030 and 2050. The novelty lies in considering, not only the impact of the operational phase but also the impact of the different stages of the life cycle and processes, obtaining an impact value closer to reality. The results indicate that, even with major retrofitting and adaptation efforts, the European targets are difficult to achieve by 2050. Moreover, solutions such as biomass help to achieve greenhouse gas reductions but not to improve energy efficiency.

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Uncertainty of building elements’ service lives in building LCA & LCC: What matters?

Cited by 70 publications

References 29 publications

Influence of methodological choices on maintenance and replacement in building LCA

Influence of methodological choices on maintenance and replacement in building LCA

Critical Review of Polymeric Building Envelope Materials: Degradation, Durability and Service Life Prediction

Environmental Assessment of University Campuses: The Case of the University of Navarra in Pamplona (Spain)

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