Environmental Impact Assessment of the Fabrication of Pipe Rehabilitation Materials

Abstract

With the consistent increase in the global population, sustainable construction has become a trend that will need to be practiced in perpetuity. The three main factors of sustainable construction that should be considered during planning and design of new projects are direct cost, social costs, and environmental impacts. Direct costs are regularly evaluated, and social costs are coming under more scrutiny, but the environmental sustainability of construction is a big issue due to increasing concerns about global climate change and carbon emissions. If reducing carbon emissions is a target, it is first essential to quantify the environmental impacts of any potential project to set the target to achieve. In the pipeline industry, carbon footprint analyses for the construction phase have been performed regularly to identify less-carbon-intensive methods. The pipeline industry, however, has yet to evaluate the environmental sustainability of its construction materials during the fabrication stages. The objective of this study is to calculate and analyze the environmental sustainability, as determined by carbon footprint and embodied energy, of 30 m (100 ft) of pipeline during the fabrication stages (material extraction, material production, and pipe manufacturing). This study focuses on three commonly used types of pipe/pipeline: prestressed concrete cylinder pipe (PCCP), PVC, and cured-in-place pipe (CIPP). This paper focuses on a large-diameter 90-cm (36-in.) sewer pressure pipe operating at 689 kPa (100 psi) internal pressure. Results show the environmental sustainability of PCCP to be lower than PVC and CIPP. The second phase of this project will focus on the environmental impacts for each material during construction and operation to determine the overall environmental footprint of each material.